The Best I Can Do
by GoldenJedi
Summary: Han&Leia, ESB. On their way to Bespin, MY way. Rating just for safety. :
1. Chapter 1

**A/N **_This story is finished, so I'll post all chapters in the next days - it takes some time, you know. The story builds slowly, but I think you'll agree with me that the rating is justified in the end. Enjoy and let me know about it! G.

* * *

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**The Best I Can Do**

**1. Day 77 - Part I **

_I've made a deal that will keep the Empire out of here forever._

Cynical, treacherous Lando. Sure he had made _a deal_.

Chewie had tried to warn him, but he didn't listen. Leia was suspicious from the start, but they had had no choice but coming here. Everywhere else seemed too dangerous or was out of range of the damaged Falcon.

He had fired, four times. Leia and Chewie had cowered behind him. Darth Vader deflected the blasts with his gauntlet-protected hands and pulled the blaster out of his grip without effort. _Without touching it_. The weapon had flown across the room to him. Damn Force.

"We would be honored if you join us," the Dark Lord said.

This couldn't be happening. Not to them, not to Leia again.

Another figured appeared next to Darth Vader. A familiar figure, wearing a blue-green Mandalorian armor. Boba Fett. It had to be him.

"I had no choice. They arrived right before you did." tried to justify himself Lando. "I'm sorry."

_He_ was sorry? Really. He looked the Baron up and down, as if measuring a hit, before taking Leia's hand.

"I'm sorry too," he answered, with a deadly look in his eyes.

* * *

At last, he had them in his power. The Princess, the smuggler and the Wookiee. Three thorns in his side that would soon be punished for their foolishness. And in the process they will attract his son to him.

Darth Vader motioned to the Princess to take a seat at his right and signaled Boba Fett to help her with the chair. "Here, Captain Solo," he said, indicating the seat at his left. The cocky pilot ignored him and sat next to the Princess. Let him have it; it won't last, the Dark Lord thought.

The Wookiee had been taken to the brig. The Sith dismissed the bounty hunter with a nod of his head. The door hissed close behind him.

"It a pleasure to meet you again, Princess," he said to the young woman at his side. She had grown up since their last encounter, matured. She was even more beautiful, if that was possible. She reminded him of someone else, long ago.

_Nonsense_, he thought, discarding the thought quickly.

"I can't say the same, Lord Vader," she answered.

Oh, always a disdainful answer in her lips. It wouldn't last, either. Whether she resembled somebody of his past, or not.

* * *

_My nightmares were right,_ Princess Leia thought. _We're all going to die_.

She had seen it very clearly. Han, lying very still, very pale. The same shirt he had put on today before arriving to Bespin. Luke, his face all battered and bruised, one hand missing. Was Luke here? Was he already a prisoner?

The rhythmic sound of Vader's respirator filled the room. It was impossible to read him, to see beyond the impenetrable mask. She raised her own façade. The Ice Princess kicked in.

"Can I ask what are you planning to do with us?" She asked, not really wanting to hear the answer.

"That is something you may find... interesting, Princess. So, tell me, how was your voyage?"

Instinctively, she reached for Han's hand under the table. Did he know?

At least they had had last night.

* * *

Han Solo had never been so close to the Sith Lord before. He found him extremely frightening. Something very dark surrounded him, and it wasn't only his armor. Sweat started to gather on the Corellian's forehead.

She had taken his hand. At least they still had that. But who knew for how long? That fellow was playing with them. If he was going to have them executed, why not finish it right now? He was unmerciful forcing Leia to chat with him, as if they were at a court banquet.

She looked - amazing. He hadn't seen her looking so regal before. Not a flinch of her eye as she looked straight into the mask.

Her voice was so cold that he barely recognized it. It was so different from the sweet, yearning whispers of last night.

* * *

They were in love. That was something anybody could see from a parsec away.

He found that fact slightly uncomfortable. It was a weakness. He'd expected her to be stronger, tougher. And to make this petty rebel smuggler the subject of her affections? She was only a woman, after all.

But it was to his advantage. He could feel the anguish already growing in the two lovers.

His informants had reported that the Princess was the boy's love interest and Solo his best friend. The security tapes found in Hoth, though damaged, showed that clearly. Friendship and love had always been clearly overrated. Lord Vader wondered how Luke would react when he found out. But they were nevertheless close to him and he should be already aware of this threat to them. If not, maybe the Emperor was wrong and he wasn't so powerful after all.

His internal clock marked that fifteen minutes had passed since he had revealed himself to them. Another fifteen would do just fine. Then the real fun would begin.


	2. Chapter 2

**2. Day 1 **

The day had been very long and very tiresome. Yet Princess Leia Organa felt she wouldn't be able to sleep tonight.

There had been a battle and an evacuation this day. A pursuit and hiding. An unheard of maneuver. And a kiss.

All of that had happened in less than a standard day.

The battle had not been fought to win, something the Alliance leaders knew to be impossible, but to delay the invasion. Thanks to the sacrifice of many, the evacuation of the base in Hoth had been as successful as hoped. Of course, her own part of the drill had been a typical Solo barely-by-a-millimeter escape. Not only had the Falcon refused to jump into hyperspace, but they had to hide in the stomach of a space slug! They have pulled through that by sheer luck. Oh, well, the run through the asteroid field had been impressive, but it was his last move that had really surprised her. She thought he had gone mad for a moment, but he had been damn right. There was a blind spot in the Star Destroyers.

His kiss had also surprised her. One moment, she wanted to kill him and then... He'd been so charming, his voice and his eyes so mesmerizing that she'd found herself unable to resist him. She had started to tremble when he took her hand and hadn't really stopped yet. But the most shocking part of it was that she had really, really enjoyed that kiss. It was everything he had half-promised, half-menaced for years and something else too. For a brief moment, all the smugness, all the banter was gone and she had felt a real connection to the man behind the mercenary. She had felt alive.

Of course, there were too many variables to ponder around this matter. The dashing scoundrel and a girl like her? Not possible. They were simply not compatible. Not a chance. No future.

Not that anybody had much of a future these days. But him... He was so full of life, even if he had nothing other than the Falcon and Chewie to rely on. As for her, her future had died the day Alderaan was blown. There was nothing she wished for herself since that day. Fighting the Empire was the only thing she really cared about. She should find a way to explain that to him. And the sooner the better.

After the Imperial fleet had left, Chewie had started running tests on every system and she had tried to help him, but the language barrier made it very difficult. Meanwhile, Han worked madly with the navicomputer. She had joined him in the cockpit with a plate of sandwiches and two glasses of juice. He broke the news. "Eleven weeks. Seventy six and a half days to Bespin, that's the best I can do." He had to save some fuel for emergency maneuvering. The provisions and the air supply would do, barely. "I guess I must be glad Rieekan was short on cash," he said wryly. The general had completed his payment in ration bars and assorted supplies. "Or that you are not the size of Chewie," he winked at Leia.

Afterwards, she had sought some quietness. She had so many things to think on. But in the small freighter, there weren't many places to be alone, except for the cargo bay, which was rather unattractive and cold. The only two cabins were obviously off-limits. She finally squeezed into one of the gunner turrets. She curled in the darkened glass bubble, under the gun, watching the stars.

* * *

Some time later, Han Solo climbed up the ladder. "Your cabin is ready, Leia," he announced. She looked at him without understanding. He went on. "You'll stay in my cabin. I've already put fresh bedlinen." She stared at him, arching a brow. What was he thinking? _One_ kiss and... "I'm staying in the cargo bay," he added, without sarcasm.

They had traveled together many times along the years, but she had always brought her own equipment. Tent, military collapsible cot and all, she used to install her bunker in a corner of the cargo bay. This time that kind of arrangement was not available.

"Oh, thank you." She blushed.

He didn't go away. He just looked at her, expectantly. At last, she understood.

"Come," she said, making some space for him in the bubble.

He crawled and finally sat by her, folding his long legs in a position that would be rather uncomfortable after a while.

She had intended to keep some distance between them and have her programmed conversation with him. But after a bit of struggle and several false starts, she found herself leaning against him, her back on his chest. Han slipped his arms around her waist, resting his chin on her shoulder. The warm of his body next to her made Leia suddenly aware of how cold she had been.

Damn. It felt so good. It felt... right. Even if it was wrong.

"You alright?" he asked.

"Barely," she half joked, half confessed. What to say next? They had a very long way ahead. And tonight, she felt too tired and too drained to have an argument with him. Besides, something had changed between them, she wasn't sure exactly what... aside the fact that they were _touching _each other, the physical barriers down. She'd never allowed someone to be so close to her since... But better not to think of that now. She turned to a safe subject. "Do you think Luke and the Rogues are alright?"

"The kid?" Did she always have to bring up Luke? What was it with the kid? Did something else happen between them after that kiss in the medic ward? He was almost sure nothing happened. _Almost_. However, this was not the moment to explore that issue. "Sure," he answered, "no wampa creatures in deep space."

They both giggled. At the sound of her laugh, Han felt a sudden urge to kiss her. Would she run away afterwards, again? There was only a way to find out.

He sensed again the faint tremble in her limbs as he turned her slightly and slowly kissed her. She didn't escape this time. In fact, as soon as they parted, she reached for his lips one more time, drawing him even closer. Then she made herself comfortable in his embrace and turned her gaze again to the stars. Now he was the one shaking all over.

* * *

Han's legs had stopped aching a long time ago. They were presently numb. He was about to shift his position when a sudden sound startled him. He waited for a few seconds, wondering if it would be repeated. Yeah, there it was again. A lopsided grin rushed to his face.

Sure, the smuggler thought, she'd been quiet for a while and he had felt her body slowly relax.

"I win, Kid," he mumbled, "Princesses do snore."


	3. Chapter 3

**3. Day 2**

She had awakened in Han's arms, astonished and embarrassed. He had barely given her a soft '_Hiya, sweetheart'_, when she squeezed out of his embrace and was suddenly all business. The Corellian followed her with an amused look in his eyes.

Han had sacrificed his cabin for her but there were other practical problems to solve. Evidently, she had no luggage and no other clothes to change into. And after all the adrenaline of the day, she desperately needed at least a sonic shower and a change. To her annoyance, she had to borrow one of Han's shirts to use as a nightgown. But she promptly turned Threepio on and entrusted him with the task of cleaning her clothes for the time she woke up.

As she slipped between the sheets, the Princess reflected on the cumulated facts that had lead to her sleeping in Han Solo's bed, wearing Han Solo's shirt. Although the man himself was staying in the cargo bay, his presence in the cabin that usually was his was ineludible. To her surprise, she found this arrangement even more uneasy than sleeping in his arms itself.

As Leia turned on the well-worn mattress, seeking a comfortable position, she noticed some bumps and hollows in it.

Blast.

The thing had the form of his owner imprinted on it. She tried to not think about which other activities besides sleeping had carved his frame so deeply there. Uncomfortable, she arched her back, avoiding the depression in the center.

So much for sleeping.

Those thoughts led again to her considering her current association with Han Solo. She had intended to clarify things between them when she invited him to join her in the gunner turret. Instead she had accepted another kiss and, following a foolish impulse, she had kissed him back. And then she had fallen asleep, for Force sake!

Where was this going? This was not her, why was she doing this? They had nothing in common, what did he want from her? For that matter, what did she expect from him?

She didn't have answers for any of those questions. They had been friendly antagonists for so long. Or antagonistic friends. One of those. But she would have a word with him tomorrow. She would be kind but firm. Definitely.

* * *

She did not.

* * *

After more than two hours of trying, Leia gave up sleeping. She slipped out of bed, opened the hatch and snatched her jumpsuit out of Threepio's hands. The faithful droid had been waiting outside her door, patiently. She ordered him to remain in the cabin untill further notice. It was too late - or too early, actually - to endure his endless babbling.

She greeted Chewbacca in the cockpit and went to get some caf. The protocol droid had informed her that Captain Solo had retired to the cargo bay an hour ago.

The Princess occupied the next hours filling her report of the Hoth battle in a borrowed datapad. The grim details slowly pushed Han out of her mind.

Princess Organa was thinking of getting her another cup of caf and maybe something to eat with it when a soft brush on her head and two strong hands on her shoulders startled her. Han.

"Mornin'," he said, "you want some breakfast?"

For an answer, she cursed in her native language.

"Not a mornin' person, uh, Princess?" the Corellian teased.

"I entered the wrong command!" Leia panicked. "My report is gone!"

"Let me see," Han Solo said, suddenly worried. Snatching the datapad from her hands, he fidgeted briefly with the controls. "Nah, here it is," he said as he gave it back to her.

Princess Leia scrolled down the file and sighed. "Yeah, I only lost the last half hour of it."

"Sorry."

He looked actually guilty. That was something new. She arched her brows and frowned, dismissing the subject.

A few minutes later, he planted two mugs of fresh caf on the table and two bowls of something that looked like wet, yellowish mud. He started to eat with obvious appetite, finishing the scorching stuff in no time. "I've got to relieve Chewie. 'Later," he said and disappeared toward the cockpit, taking his caf with him.

The Princess inspected her breakfast reluctantly. It was probably now below the boiling point of water, so she dared to taste it. It was some kind of precooked cereal, soft and somewhat sweet, with a dash of unidentifiable spices. Nevertheless, it brought a comfortable sensation in her stomach once it arrived there.

She didn't want to be harsh on Han; he was so obviously trying to be nice. Maybe if she just _ignored_ him...

* * *

It was really a very long day.

* * *

Chewbacca came by, ate his dinner and went to his cabin to catch some sleep. Princess Leia finished her report and joined Han in the cockpit. He was still worried about the long-range scanners being down. The only way to have some warning in case they've got company was to keep always an eye on the screens. They would have to take shifts watching it.

"Count me in for that," Leia volunteered, "I don't want to be a passenger."

"You sure you wanna be under my command?" Han questioned, deploying a crooked smile.

"Sure." Maybe that would keep him at bay. Smuggler's honor and all that.

"Alright, let's go through the basics," the Captain started.

She spent four hours in the cockpit that day, checking endlessly an incredibly long list of switches and dials, under Han's surveillance. Very_ close_ surveillance. Evidently, he didn't read that part of the Command Handbook.

After a quick bite, she renewed her acquaintance with the macrofuser, under Chewie's supervision this time. But in her fifty-second consecutive hour without sleep (not counting her short nap in Han's arms the day before) she misunderstood the signaling of her hairy fellow and welded the piece the Wookiee had patiently reconstructed upside down.

The roaring and shouting that followed made Captain Solo jump out of his seat and run to his crew, fearing to find one of them gravely wounded. Instead, he discovered Chewbacca cornered by a fiery Princess yelling at the top of her lungs "You didn't tell me that! You didn't!"

Watching the show, Han considered teaching her some Shyriiwook in the future, so the three of them could stay alive until arriving at Bespin. And Chewie _would_ collaborate gladly in that project. First he had to do something about the Princess's sleep, or lack of, really. He had noticed the dark circles under her eyes earlier and her jumpiness, but thought it was something she had to solve for herself. Untill it affected his ship and his crew.

He grabbed Leia by her shoulders and directed her to the lounge. She protested, to no avail. "Sit there," he ordered. She fumed a bit, but obeyed. Han sat by her. "Have you had a decent amount of sleep, let's say, six hours a day, in the last week?" She reddened and shook her head. "Four?" More shaking. "Two?"

"I'm sorry," she said, for some strange reason on the verge of tears.

"You should apologize to Chewie, not me."

"I will."

Chewbacca roared gently from the other compartment.

"He says it doesn't matter, he'd never rip arms out of their sockets to somebody smaller than a ten-seasons-old Wookiee youngling," Han translated.

"Thank you, Chewie." The Princess sounded relieved but utterly exhausted. "I think I'll try to sleep now."

"Wait. I'll give you my special." The Corellian fussed for a while in the kitchenette and returned with a steaming mug. "Drink."

She sniffed the contents of the mug warily.

"Hey, trust me," he smirked. "It's just blue milk with some Kashyyykian honey. Luke left a container last time. Oh, alright, it has a good shot of Whyren's Reserve in it, but that won't hurt you."

She lifted the mug with shaking hands and drank, cautiously at first and eagerly later. The warm dissolved partially the knots in her stomach and the delicate fumes of the liquor tickled in her nose.

Then, he took her hand and dragged her gently to the main cabin.

They stopped by the hatch, but before she could dismiss him, he swiftly slid an arm around her waist and pulled her against him.

She raised her head a bit surprised, looking into his eyes. Han took advantage of it and leaned down, capturing her lips in a kiss. A kiss that deepened when he pushed her slightly off-balance, pressing her against the curved wall with his body.


	4. Chapter 4

**4. Day 3**

Princess Leia awakened slightly disoriented, trying to focus and recall where she was.

She was abruptly conscious of the bunk under her body and to whom it belonged. Piece by piece, she reconstructed what had happened the previous days and why was she sleeping there

_Damn_, she thought. Han had managed to kiss her again. She would never accept anything to drink from that man again. Alcohol, exhaustion and Han Solo were not a good combination. She had almost felt herself melt under his thorough kiss. Until the metal on her back reminded her of another time and another place where she had been pushed against the durasteel.

But even before she could gather herself to reject him, he had palmed the hatch open and Threepio had emerged from the cabin greeting them cheerfully. That droid was definitely the best chaperon she ever had. He was risking expeditious dismantling by Han if he kept doing this, though.

Nevertheless, she had gone to bed with a glowing sensation inside her chest. Whether it came from Han's kiss or from the liquor, she did not know. But for the first time in weeks, she had slept like a baby.

Her chrono said it was only 0530, but that meant that she had been sleeping almost twelve hours in a row. Evidently, Solo's recipe worked.

The backside of that was that she had missed dinner and her stomach felt rather empty.

"Alright, Organa. Party is over," she whispered, swinging her legs out of bed.

* * *

Han was out of sight, thank goodness, probably still sleeping. The Princess greeted Chewie in the cockpit and went to prepare some caf. She almost dropped the pot when someone grabbed her from behind and she received a warm kiss on her neck that sent shivers down her spine. _Oh, no, here we go again_, she thought. Sighing, she stated, "We'd have to go without the brewer if you keep doing that..." Han gave her his best _Who, me?_ look and she almost laughed. Almost, but not quite. This was going to be difficult. _Kind but firm_, she reminded herself. 

The breakfast was awkward. They sat together on the bench around the holo-chess table, talking about the schedule for the day. But every time Han moved a centimeter closer to her, she unconsciously moved another centimeter away. She was telling him that she wanted him to teach her today all about the weapons systems when she reached the end of the seat and almost fell of it.

Reddening deeper that she already was, Princess Leia stood up and asked "So, what do you say, Captain?"

"Why don't you relax a bit and take it like a long-deserved vacation, Leia?"

"Vacation? This is no pleasure cruise, Han."

"Well, it could be, y'know." He winked at her. "If you just could stop _working_ for a while..."

"And what would I do instead? Braid my hair all day long?" 

"You never let your hair down, don't you?" He said almost under his breath. Han Solo stretched and intertwined his fingers behind his head, a mischievous look in his eyes. "But I'd love to cooperate with a few ideas to fill the time, if you like," he offered.

"Sure you will, you nerfherder." The epithet slipped out of her lips without her noticing before it was too late. So much for the _kind_ part.

"I though we'd agreed in droppin' the names, your Highnessness." He had turned suddenly serious.

"We did? I remember you saying you would be nice."

"And I'm not?" His voice dropped two tones.

"No," she said, looking at him sternly. "You're harassing me."

"I'm what?" Han looked genuinely surprised. "Oh, I see, you want me to be respectful and boring, like Luke."

"Leave Luke out of this. And I don't want anything from you." The Princess crossed her arms on her chest.

"You don't? You didn't seem to think that way yesterday, or the day before." He stood to his full height, his hand clutching the edge of the table in frustration.

"You are right," she conceded, taking a deep breath. "I made a mistake. But I don't want a relationship right now, Han." That was it. She had said it.

"Who's talkin' about a _relationship_, sister?" Han spat back, his face merely two centimeters from her's. "You'll report to me at 1100 for your training, Princess," he uttered in the coldest tone he was capable of, striding out of the compartment.

His angry steps on the deck hammered in resonance with Leia's heart.

* * *

Another long day followed.

* * *

At 1100, Leia joined Han in the cockpit as requested. After another three hours of checking dials and flinching switches, he declared her apt. "You have the next shift, darlin'," he said upon vacating his chair. She opened her mouth to ask for ten minutes to grab something to eat and go to the fresher, but her pride prevented her from saying anything. 

At 1800, food seemed something almost mythological and the discomfort in her bladder was building up, but she stubbornly refused to give up and abandon her station.

Chewbacca rescued her partially at 2100 with a cold nerf sandwich and juice. She thanked the Wookiee and biting eagerly her dinner she wondered where Han would be. Not far enough away for her liking, that was for sure.

At 2200, she declared herself off-duty and started a quick run to the fresher. Chewie growled something to her when she left, but she obviously didn't understand anything.

As she passed through the darkened lounge area, she saw two bottles over the table, one of them evidently empty. Green glass, silver label, expensive kind. She stopped before noticing that Han was at the far end of the table, sunken in the seat, almost only the top of his head visible. He was leaning over the seat, his feet dangling over the edge. She tried to retire without waking him when his eyes flung open.

"You want some?" He asked slurring the syllables, signaling the bottles with his head.

"I thought you didn't like sparkling wine."

"I don't. I was saving them for a special occasion, but it will never happen, will it, Princess?"

The stinging remark died in her lips when she perceived that there was a certain sadness in his words. He wasn't bantering this time. It was one of the rare opportunities when Han Solo spoke what he really thought. But it was pointless to reason with him while under the influence of alcohol. Swallowing her confusion and her irritation, she continued to the fresher with all the dignity she could gather.

* * *

Han watched her go away, doing that little swing with her hips that she always did when she was angry. Maybe that was why he managed to make her mad at him so often, which in turn was driving him crazy. 


	5. Chapter 5

5. DAY 10

For a while, beside her shifts in the cockpit, she mainly slept, making up for all the hours of sleep she had gone without in the last few years.

The technique Luke had tried to teach her almost three years ago had helped her to rest. It was one of the few things General Kenobi had had time to teach him. A breathing technique aimed at relaxing the body and the mind. She really didn't know why she had remembered it right now, but after a couple of trials, it worked. Practicing this exercise every night for a few minutes allowed her to sleep peacefully as many hours as she needed. If she had listened to Luke the first time, she would have saved a lot of electro-induction and maybe some nightmares.

Thinking of Luke, she remembered the last time she had seen him. In the rush of the upcoming battle, she had barely squeezed his arm and murmured _good luck _in her way to address the pilots escorting the transports. They both had averted each other's eyes then. She had never apologized to him for using him so shamefully to pay back Han. That was another impending conversation that she hoped it would go better than the one with Han.

Han.

Han, Han, Han.

He was still not talking to her, except for practical issues, like 'kindly' suggesting that she started to learn some Shyriiwook, tutored by Chewie. Threepio and Han could translate if necessary, but she could not help but agree that in case of need it was faster if she could understand him directly, at least on a basic level. It gave her also something to fill her time with - exactly what Han had promised, she had to acknowledge - and an opportunity to get to know the Wookiee better.

The Corellian captain had assigned her to the afternoon shift, taking himself the morning one and Chewie the nights. With careful timing, they managed to barely see each other for several days. Half of her was absolutly convinced that he was the one who had to apologize while her other half wanted already to apologize to him. She hadn't treated him fairly and she knew it. But things where simpler this way, and so the days passed.

The first few days of this voyage had been busy working on the repairable damage. After that, she had to squeeze her imagination to keep the boredom at bay. She was not used to idleness, but there was not much to do on the small freighter besides tinkering with it.

Han had given her access to the Falcon's databanks, so she could use the Shyriiwook learning program. There were seven different databanks on the Falcon, none of them of the same origin. And they were all full almost to the top with files and programs of the widest spectrum imaginable. No wonder the ship was almost schizophrenic.

One advantage of having access to the databanks was that, among dozens and dozens of recorded smashball games, she found some holo-vids of a more interesting kind. Some were pretty old, but she had not had much time lately to catch on with the latest in entertainment, or had she? She soon established a routine where she would watch a vid late in the morning after a session with the learning program.

* * *

Her cool indifference was driving him crazy. He was positive about that. 

How could she just stare at him and make him feel so guilty and at the same time, on the verge of strangling her? Or kissing her. Or... Damn! Her being so close and so far simultaneously was proving to be such a torture.

Chewie had lectured him extensively about his mistreating of the Princess. "She wouldn't accept my apologies, old fuzzball!" He had whispered, trying not to be heard by Leia. **I'm not talking to you until you do so**, the Wookiee simply answered.

It was a long and lonely week for Han indeed.

The exchanges between him and Leia were reduced to a bare minimum, that is, when she felt the need to insult him.

Last night, for example. Leia had come from the cockpit when Chewie relived her. Without acknowledging him, she had approached the kitchenette and investigated the stew he had cooked a little earlier. Grabbing a spoon, she had started to fill a bowl with it. Han could not help watching her, finding the curve of her neck - and every other curve - simply fascinating.

"What?" She had angrily asked, turning around and catching him in the act.

"Can't I even _watch_?" he had responded, defensively.

"I'm not an exhibition at a museum, Captain." Taking a flask of water from the cooler, she had carried her dinner to her cabin. That was not unexpected, since she had not shared any meals with him since their fight.

Tonight, things had been different. She had gone straight to her cabin, without saying a word. Without taking anything to eat with her. It was true that they had to be careful with the provisions, but that was a bit over the top. And his cooking was not bad at all. And now that he thought of it, she probably didn't eat anything at lunch either, he had noticed that the cooler had not been disturbed. She would get too thin again. What if she was sick? "Stop it, Solo," he scolded himself. "What d'ya care if she eats or not? She doesn't want anything from you..."

Who would say three years ago that he'd be concerned about some Princess's eating?

Roaming the databanks for a smashball game whose score he did not remember, Han Solo noticed the last file accessed . A Holo-vid, and a pretty old too. The title sounded familiar... and then he suddenly recognized it. Blast! He should have erased or encoded that! Did she see it? Yeah, he was sure Chewie was still asleep at that time... Maybe she had not see it all, maybe she hadn't watch it up to the part where...

Well, that could explain the lack of appetite. Picking a random game and not watching it, he promised himself that he would try to talk to her tomorrow.

* * *

It was three minutes to midnight when a scream pierced through the quiet ship. 


	6. Chapter 6

6. DAY 11 – Part I

It was three minutes to midnight when a scream pierced through the quiet ship.

In a fraction of a second, Han Solo reached the hatch to Princess Leia's cabin, only to bump into See-Threepio and barrage him with Corellian curses. Chewbacca joined him a minute later. They hesitated by the door for a moment when a second shriek reached their ears and the three of them at the same time palmed the door open. Unable to respond to three inputs at the same time, it remained shut. Cursing again, Han finally got it to open.

Leia Organa lay in her bunk, entangled in the covers, crying, fighting against some invisible enemy.

Han halted dead in his tracks, entranced by the sight of her naked legs emerging from the mess of sheets and blankets. Chewie pushed him in, breaking the spell, and he rushed immediately to her side. Sitting on the bed, he pulled her into a sitting position too.

"Go away!" She shouted with all her might, trying to free her arms from Han's hold. "I won't tell you!" Looking around without recognizing him or Chewie, her face suddenly assumed the expression of a little child. "Please, don't hurt me anymore," she begged softly. The tears running down her cheeks and the way her hair was arranged, in two simple long braids, added to the illusion.

"Mistress Leia, you're scaring me!" The golden droid started. "Shut up, Goldenrod," Han menaced.

"Leia, wake up!" The Corellian shook her gently by the upper arms in an effort to bring her to reality. She suddenly sobered, an indescribable cold creeping into her eyes and in her voice. "Who are you?" She asked before reaching up with her hand and scratching Han's face.

More surprised than hurt, Han released her and she jumped like a spring towards the hatch, knocking down the only chair in the room in the process. Chewie caught the Princess by the waist in the middle of her leap and brought her back to the bed. She didn't try to escape again. Embracing the Wookiee, she started to cry again with heartbreaking sobs. "It's gone! Everybody's gone!"

Han Solo placed a hand on her back while his first mate kept holding her and so the three of them stayed for a while. See-Threepio watched, puzzled.

* * *

Leia calmed down after a while and for a minute, she seemed to sleep again. But a moment later she opened her eyes and realized that she was not alone.

"Wha... what are you doing here?" She asked. Chewbacca loosened his embrace and she retired to the corner where the bunk met the walls, pulling the sheets all the way up to her chin.

"You had a pretty bad nightmare, sweetheart," Han said tentatively. The Wookiee supported him, growling gently. The Princess pressed her palm against her sweaty forehead. "Yeah, a nightmare. I wish it were only that." The Corellian swallowed hard and squeezed her foot over the covers. "Get dressed and come out."

"No, Han, I don't want to..."

"I'm the Captain, remember? C'mon, I'll fix you something to eat. Chewie, let's go." In his way out, he put the chair back in his place and handed her her clothing, trying to ignore the best he could the still humid Alliance-issue underwear on top. He was too worried about her to notice that in the process he blushed as if he'd never seen a bra before. "You know you won't sleep anyhow. And an empty stomach is the best thing to attract nightmares," he kept saying. Cracking a half smile, he added, "If you don't come out in ten, I'll come in, so be warned."

* * *

Twenty minutes later, she exited her cabin, only to find Han leaning on the wall in front of it. "It was about time, your Highness," he commented dryly. She followed him to the lounge and both seated by the holo-chess table. "So, what would it be? A soup? Stew? Something sweet?"

"Why are you so obsessed with feeding me?" Princess Leia shot back. But there was no aggression in her voice, just a tiredness that made her sound much older than she was, in blatant contradiction with her childish look. She was wearing her whole uniform, jumpsuit, snowjacket, boots and even the gloves, but she hadn't bother to straighten her hair. It still clung in two loose braids, framing her face.

"I'm not obsessed!" Han protested. "But Rieekan will kill me if I deliver you in skin and bones."

"So, that's what I am to you, a cargo to be delivered in good shape."

"No! That's not it!" Han stopped on his tracks when he recognized the familiar path. No, he couldn't do that now. He had tried to lighten the air, but it had been the wrong turn to take. She hadn't even lifted her face to answer him. Maybe the straight approach will be the best. "It was that holo-vid, wasn't it?"

She raised her head immediately. "How do you...?" She started, but could not continue. "Never mind..."

"Yeah, it does, because it's my fault. I should have erased that vid." That would make her react.

Her head shot up and he saw the fire in her eyes.

"You erase that and I kill you, I promise."

A roguish grin came to his lips, authomatically.

"Well, that's the Princess I know. Better?"

The smallest of all smiles bloomed in a corner of her mouth. He motioned to take her hand, but she avoided it, brazing herself like if she was cold. "Not now, Han. Please," she asked, evidently forcing the words out and turning her face from him.

Suddenly, it hit him.

He recalled the gossips that had run around all the bases where she had stayed. The talking about her nightmares and what was the cause of them. Some people said that losing her planet, her people and her family in a single blow was enough. Others, just shook their heads and said nothing, but tried to make her life as comfortable as they could.

As for himself, he did not know what to believe. She'd never had a nightmare (that he had noticed) when they had gone on missions together. And, of course, her debriefing had been labeled top secret and available only to the High Council, not even his most charming smile had granted him a copy. She always seemed so in control, that he at last had discarded that suspicion and ascribed her growing thinness and bad temper to mourning. Hey, she was a Princess and a Senator, after all, right? They wouldn't treat her like that, right? Execution, yes, but torture? And if they had gone that far, they couldn't have been too harsh, she would have talked and they wouldn't have needed to put a tracking device on the Falcon. Besides, she looked in perfect shape when they met on the Death Star.

After a while, she had regained some weight, the nightmares receded something and the whole Alliance breathed again. Even then, the only time her cheeks became something near colored were when he got her all riled up, so he kept doing that. Besides, she started it half of the time. Any other time, Ice Princess was a name that fitted her perfectly.

But now, after hearing those blood-freezing screams and what she'd said in her dream, he wasn't sure anymore. "What the hell did they do to you, Princess?"

Truth be told, he did not expect any answer, it was more a rhetoric question spoke aloud.

"_Twelve Hells_. They used _Twelve Hells_ on me," she deadpanned.

Han Solo wondered how much out of the protocol was to throw up in front of the High Princess of Alderaan.


	7. Chapter 7

**7. Day 11 – Part II**

_Twelve Hells. They used Twelve Hells on me._

Leia's words echoed once and again inside his head. His mind recognized them but his soul refused to find any meaning to those words. "How long?" Han heard himself asking.

"Five days."

Five days! Sweet Corellian stars! She endured that for five days! The worst nightmare of the Kessel Mine prisoners! Nobody in his knowledge had survived more than three.

The wicked invention consisted of an arrangement of twelve needles or probes controlled by a droid. Once attached to the subject, electric current started to flow through them, at random intervals and increasing intensity. Drugs enhanced the experience, and nobody was known to be capable of resisting interrogation under these circumstances.

Nobody, but her, it seemed.

Finally, everything stopped spinning and he chanced a side-glance at her. Leia was still looking down, her hair almost covering her face. He wanted to hold her so badly that it hurt, but he did not. She had showed very clearly that she did not want to be touched and he intended to respect her wish. Long time ago, he had heard that the pain produced by this particular kind of torture stuck to the skin, even long after it was healed. Sadly, he reflected that if the Imperials had gone so far with her as to use _Twelve Hells_, they probably had given her as well the rest of the usual treatment.

Han Solo felt a new tenderness and admiration for the Princess grow inside of him. Kriff, even after going through all that, she had managed to save the day back there in the Death Star! He had known before that she was strong-willed, almost ruthless in her determination to carry away whatever it was necessary to defeat the Empire, but it was not until now he had a full notion of the depth of her strength. He felt dwarfed, inadequate. He had had all the signs before him to read for years and he had chosen to ignore them, to catalog her as a pushy but sultry nuisance.

Feeling completely powerless, he offered the only thing she would maybe accept from him at this point.

"D'ya want to talk about it?"

* * *

Talk? _Talk_? How could she talk about this to him? To anybody, for that matter. Her debriefing had not had many more words. Fortunately, the events where self-explanatory: if she had betrayed the Alliance, the Death Star would have arrived at Yavin much earlier. They had doubted her recollection about the amount of time Vader worked on her, though. They said she must have lost track of the time at some point, because nobody could stand five days of _Twelve Hells_.

Most of the people thought that her nightmares were about Alderaan, and they were, but not only about that. How could she explain to Han or anybody else the three hours shower she took after delivering Artoo to the technical crew, that day on Yavin? That she spent another doing the same thing after hugging him and Luke after the battle? Explain the nightmare that had been no nightmare where she lay naked and cold and dirty and in pain, and the stormtroopers made fun of her? And the worst of all, the nightmare inside a nightmare where she felt Darth Vader inside her mind and feared she was going crazy.

She still did, sometimes.

She had improved a lot since those first days, though, and the bad dreams and bad memories came less often, but speaking about it was something she still could not do, and she did not know if she would ever be ready for that.

"No," she simply answered.

For a long while, neither of them spoke nor moved. Han, who usually could not remain still for his life, was for once quiet. Strangely enough, the tension slowly spent itself and this moment of serene companionship was what Leia would remember later as the turning point in their lives.

* * *

She was the one to break the silence, at last.

"What about that soup you offered?"

Han looked at her with big astonished eyes, as if she were asking him to jump out of an airlock. "Of course," he answered and as soon as the request sunk into him and he sprang to the freezer to get it.

_Good_, she thought, watching him emerge triumphal with a frozen container. She had noticed long ago that putting him to do something useful when things got tricky was good for him. They were so much alike in that

Han Solo pulled the soup out of the reheater a few seconds before the program finished. She did not like her meals that hot. He poured the aromatic cream in his best bowl and presented it to Princess Leia.

She motioned to grab the spoon but halted midway, staring at her gloved hand. With an annoyed look, she peeled the gloves off and tossed them angrily aside. After that, she carried spoonful after spoonful methodically to her mouth. Pausing between two of them, she praised the concoction. "It's good," she said, breaking a pale smile.

"It's my favorite," he gleefully replied.

* * *

"I want to watch it again," she announced when she finished eating.

"You sure?"

"Yes."

She took her jacket off while he summoned the file. The vid was a boring love story, but the last half-hour had been recorded on location in Alderaan. More precisely, in the Royal Gardens. Han did not bother to conceal that he knew by heart the exact point were the sequence started.

The holo-camera first followed the leading lady through the ornated gates. In the background, Aldera's Palace emerged in all its glory. There was some kind of festivity going on. Between bushes with pink and yellow flowers, a scene was mounted where a group of girls performed a traditional dance. The girls wore loose trapezoidal dresses of translucent shimmersilk the same colors as the flowers. The camera lingered for a minute on them, till the dance ended. As the music died suffocated by the applause and the little dancers bowed, one of the girls was given a big bunch of the same pink and yellow flowers. She carefully stepped down the scene and ceremonially walked to the front row of seats, in the middle of which a grey-haired man clad all in white was sitting. The man stood and he was very tall, and the girl presented the flowers to him. After that, she made a perfect curtsy in front of him, but when she lifted her face again, she winked at him. The man laughed warmly and hugged her and the crowd cheered, throwing petals in the air.

In the next scene, the camera followed another man along a path through the garden and towards the lake. The trees grew graciously along the slope and an ancient statue of the Goddess carved in grey-greenish stone could be seen emerging of the sea of leaves. Along the shore of the lake, there was a shining white sand beach and a myriad of gulls fished in the sparkling water. The man found the woman from the beginning there and for a while the camera only showed their faces engaged in a completely uninteresting conversation, at least for Han and Leia. The Corellian fast-forwarded that part and slowed down it to normal speed when the couple kissed and the camera started to widen its focus like if it was gaining height. Slowly the image incorporated the whole lake, the castle, the city and the mountains. Fade to black.

Han Solo paid really little attention to what the holo-vid displayed. His focus was centered in the woman by him, whose only sign of emotion was a certain tightening of her jaw when the man in white appeared. When it ended, she spoke exactly four words.

"Play it again, Han."

* * *

"Again."

* * *

"Again."

* * *

By the sixth rerun, he protested. "You can't keep going like this, Leia."

"One more time, please, Han. I'll be alright." Her deep brown eyes begged him and he couldn't resist. As if to reassure him, she took his hand and pulled him to sit by her. The vid played again and Solo gained some courage as he noticed that she had kept her hand in his. "That's your father, right?" he asked. She nodded, squeezing his hand harder. "It was the first time he allowed me to dance in public," she said, absentmindedly.

"What?"

"I'm the one with the flowers." If she had looked at him, she would have seen his eyes bulging.

"That's you?" The Corellian froze the holo and enlarged the scene, until the girl winking and the man in white filled the frame. At the sight of the almost natural size image of Bail Organa smiling to the little girl she had once been, something broke inside the Princess.

"I... miss him so much," she said with strangled voice.

A tear fell down her cheek and then another.

All of a sudden, she collapsed in Han arms, weeping uncontrollably.


	8. Chapter 8

**8. Day 11 – Part III**

A headache was brewing behind Han Solo's tired eyes. Although no physical display was required from him, the emotional toll had been heavy, and the night had been long. Only a little before the time he was supposed to relieve Chewie, Leia had retired to her cabin again. She had been there since then, as far as he knew.

The shock he'd felt upon her confession hadn't disappeared yet. He still felt nauseated and moved to his very core. What she had endured had broken down people apparently stronger than her, and yet here she was still bossing people around. It was not fair by any means that she had had to suffer that much at such a young age. Even if she had been a pampered Princess once.

That had been one of the many surprises of the night. He had had that holo-vid for many years; he was sure that he had downloaded it for one of his former girlfriends but didn't recall exactly which one of them. He had always known that Viceroy Bail Organa was the man in white, because he was acknowledged and thanked profusely in the credits. Since he'd met Leia on the Death Star, he had watched the last half-hour of the vid probably a hundred times. However, it had never gone across his mind that the girl with the flowers could be her.

_Her Royal Highness Leia Organa_. The Senator that had been tortured by Darth Vader and didn't give in. The woman that had caught his eye since they first met. The Rebel leader he'd been infatuated with for three years. The friend that had almost died because of his stupid debt with a Hutt crime Lord. The damaged girl that had been crying in his arms for her lost father. The stranger that had kissed him like she'd never kissed him before. Which one was the true Leia?

The sensation of her arms around him still lingered in his flanks. She had curled up in his lap and let him comfort her as long as the tears run free and beyond. He had held her tight till the shaking of her body stopped, whispering sweet nonsense in her ear. At first she had cried and shouted, punching his shoulder with her fist more than once, letting go of her grief, her anger and her guilt. In the end, he would had thought that she had fell asleep if it weren't for the occasional sigh and the grazing of her eyelashes against the skin of his throat.

Chewie had peeked in for a moment and cast him an interrogatory look somewhere along. Seeing that everything was under control, he retired again to the cockpit. Fortunately, he had taken the precaution of deactivating Goldenrod while he was waiting for her to dress or he would had shot him for good if he had started asking his damned questions.

He wondered how she would react when she got up. Would she be resentful because their mouths had drifted together and the inevitable had happened? He had not intended to. Certainly, he wasn't thinking about it. And he was pretty sure he didn't start it.

Well, fairly sure.

Moderately sure?

What had he done, for kriff sake?

The thing was that his lips had found hers already parted and they had joined like drawn by the powerful, unavoidable gravity well of a black hole. First just the soft, enticing brush of wet flesh over wet flesh, the savoring of their breaths, and the tentative, exploring tongues tasting the salty remnants of her tears. And then there was chaos and hunger and need and they battled against each other and against themselves wildly and both surrendered, hands franticly recognizing each other shapes.

But any living creature needs to breath now and then and the smuggler and the Princess were no exception to that rule. They finally had to part and their eyes locked for a moment in awe and fear.

And then she fled.

He followed her as soon as his body responded to his commands again, but the hatch was already closed and he remained there, dreading to hear her crying. Or cursing.

Something.

Anything.

But he heard nothing and it was almost time to relieve Chewie.

It was not as they had never kissed before. But their few previous kisses had not felt like this. _She _had not felt like this before. It had caught him off-guard, hey, everything had caught him off-guard last night. And to his despair, he had behaved just like the half-witted nerf-herder she had called him a few days ago, and taken advantage of her vulnerability. She had confessed her abuse by the Imperials and what had he done? Abuse her further. Betray her trust. And it didn't matter who had started it, he shouldn't have been carried away.

His ruminations were interrupted by the sound of some light steps he knew well.

Leia was coming.

Han sunk in his chair and prepared himself for her scolding. _Here we go again_, he thought.

She stepped into the cockpit cautiously. Han was in the pilot's seat but did not turn around to greet her. Was he mad at her? Yeah, he probably was. She revised in her mind what she wanted to say to him and sighted.

"Han," Princess Leia said.

He turned at last and looked at her straight in the eye. "Good morning, your Highness, or should I say afternoon?"

"Han, we need to talk," she insisted. "I... was not... myself last night."

"Spare me, Leia." His voice sounded harsh and hurt, and his hand raised as to put a barrier between them. "I behaved myself like a bantha and I know it. I'm... sorry. I'll tell Chewie that if he sees me being closer than arms length from ya, he can rip my arms out of its sockets. But for the record, I don't think you weren't yourself last night, I think you were perfectly like you, ya just don't wanna admit it!" His long tirade left him out of breath.

The Princess tapped her foot twice on the deck. "You finished?"

"Yeah," he sputtered defiantly._ Wait,_ the Corellian thought_, was she... smiling?_

"I wanted to say thank you."

"What?"

"Thank-you. Thanks for being there for me when I needed you."

His jaw dropped slightly first and then he smiled. No, not his sarcastic smirk nor his lopsided predatory grin. Just his smile, the one that crept into his hazel eyes and made them sparkle. And the Princess smiled with him.

It was then that she noticed the three thin reddish lines on his cheek. "Did I do that?" She asked, touching them lightly with slim fingers.

"Alright, you win, that wasn't like you," he said, covering her hand with his own and added, "...I hope. Or maybe it wasn't me, was it?"

She seemed to ponder her answer for a moment but she never had the opportunity to answer. An ominous rapping on the hull made them switch to full alert mode.

"Leia, the shields!!" Han shouted.


	9. Chapter 9

9. Day 15

The rapping on the hull turned out to be an usually harmless micrometeor shower. Small fragments of rock that wandered through the galaxy for eons, to end being sucked up by some star in the vast majority of cases. But that was not the destiny of this particular group of pebbles. Its path had crossed the one of a small and battered Corellian light freighter and some of them crashed into the unprotected hull. Many of them just bounced against it, leaving a new dent at the point of impact. Most of them were repelled when the energy shields went on and did no damage. But two of them, their mass and speed just enough to gather enough energy to pierce through two-centimeter-wide durasteel plating, went through. They vaporized in the process, leaving a couple of small holes through which the vital air leaked.

Normally, Han Solo would have just rearranged the containment energy grid that reinforced the hull to stop the leak. But that was only a temporary solution till the ship could be landed and the holes repaired. And it was also energy costly, so it couldn't be applied in a long-term basis. And energy or breathing air was not something the three souls on board the Millenium Falcon could waste.

Finally, if the long-range sensors had been on-line, the alarms would have warned them with plenty of time to dodge them. But since only the short-range ones were working, the only sign of them was a flickering dot on a screen, which unfortunately was behind Han's back at that moment.

Within seconds, the shields were up and the ship's Captain was surveying the damage. "Damn!" He swore, noticing the activity in the pressure gauges. "Chewie will be here in a minute," he announced to a disoriented Leia, upon exiting the cockpit.

After a shouting match with the Wookiee, Han went EVA. ExtraVehicular Activity. The Princess hated it, it was hazardous in the best of cases. A few seconds later, Chewbacca entered the cockpit, still growling under his breath. He sat in the copilot chair and directed a long speech to Leia, who only understood three words of it: _no_, _danger_ and _sleep_. But it was more than enough for the princess to understand what was worrying him.

But nothing of what they feared happened. A few minutes later, the perforations were sealed and Han announced that he was going to check on the sensor array. That meant to deactivate the whole positioning/communications system and Chewie only agreed after another heated argument. But nothing went wrong and not long after he was reentering the Millenium Falcon.

Han Solo stood there in front of the airlock, with a component of the sensor array in one hand like a trophy and a smug smile on his face, while his travel companions shouted at him.

When they finished, he went to the shop at the back of the ship to localize a replacement for the damaged part and Chewie started to put on his own EVA suit. He went out with the brand new element and a little later, he signaled Han to turn the system on.

Nothing happened. After a few minutes of trying, they realized that the Millenium Falcon was basically blind and deaf.

When Chewie finally gave up and came in, all hell broke loose. Princess Leia realized that since that moment, she had never seen the Wookiee really angry and that an angry Chewbacca could be really, really frightening, even if his fury was directed at somebody else.

For the next two days it was all trial and error, error and trial.

The Captain and his copilot compared notes and memories, sketching madly on flimsy and arguing about what was the last modification they did to that system. Chewbacca went EVA two more times, trying different solutions to no avail. They took short naps now and then, ate whatever Threepio cooked and Leia put on the table and continued. She tried to help with the investigation of the failure but the thing was so out of the normal standards that she didn't even understand how it actually had worked the first time.

Only at the end of the third day they found the true problem and Han went out for the last time. When he came back, the threesome stopped breathing for a second as Han punched the button to turn the system on.

If the vacuum had carried the sound, their cheering would have been heard in Bespin itself. They had not only the short-range sensors back, but the long-range ones as well.

"This is worth a celebration!" Han proposed and dashed to the kitchenette.

An hour and a half later, they were sitting to dinner the three of them together, for the first time in that voyage. The long-range scanner working meant that it was not mandatory that someone remained in the cockpit at all times.

Han had been inspired or maybe it was that it was the first relaxed meal they had had in a long time, but everything tasted wonderful to Leia that night. The main course, the dessert, the wine, the company: everything felt just perfect.

Finally, Chewie grunted his excuses and left them alone. The silence stretched while the Princess emptied her glass of red wine. Han shifted in his seat and moved closer to her but not close enough to make her uncomfortable. There was something he had been brewing the last three days and now was maybe the right moment to face it. But he had to be careful, very careful.

"So," he started, "where were we?" 

"Hmm?" Leia Organa looked at him over the rim of her glass.

"Our talk," he clarified. "The one that got interrupted by the sithspawned rocks."

"Oh." She gave him a non-compromising look.

"Yeah, 'oh'" Han teased.

"Oh." She repeated, playing innocence. "I wanted to thank you."

"You already said that. But there's no need," he said earnestly. Nevertheless, a naughty glint appeared in his eyes when he continued. "But if you insist, I've got somethin' in mind..."

Leia Organa narrowed her eyes in suspicion. _Han's got something in mind? That's dangerous!_

"Hey, trust me, we are friends, ain't we?"

The Princess made straight eye contact with him for the first time in this conversation and studied him for a while.

"Friends don't..." She finally said, waving vaguely her hand, "...you know."

He tilted his head a little and his seductive smile widened a bit.

"Why not?" Han asked, moving a bit closer. "If you want it and I want it, why not?"

She blushed now, knowing exactly what he was referring to. In fact, what he was referring to had been in her mind for a while. She had dreamed about that last kiss when asleep, she had been frightened as to what was she going to do about it when awake. Or what was Han going to do about it. About that kiss that had tasted like glory and fire at the same time. In fact, it had been the intensity of those feelings that had made her flee. It had been too much time since she had felt that way about anybody.

No, that was not true.

She had not felt that way with anybody ever. She did not know she was capable of. And _that_ was frightening. And enticing. But she didn't answer and for once, let him do what he was best at. Seduce her.

Since she did not deny it, he went on, now with a serious expression on his face. "Listen, Leia, I know you've been through hell and now I understand some things better. But still... can't we try?"

"Try what?" She asked, alarms ringing in her ears.

He hesitated, looking for the right words.

"Be... more than friends..."

"Why now? I don't want to be a charity case," she blunted, a shadow passing through her face.

"That's not what I meant!" Han Solo panicked slightly. "It's just that now I see some things clearer."

He took a deep breath and continued. "I... I care for you. A lot. I always have. It's not the same."

She shook her head slowly.

"I don't know, Han."

"That's just it, you dunno, I dunno, why don't we find out?" He was almost begging now and she felt compelled to meet his intense gaze again. There was a new quality to his deep masculine voice, a tenderness, maybe even respect, she hadn't heard or noticed before.

"Find out?" She repeated like hypnotized.

"See where it goes. And if it goes nowhere, nobody has to know, I'll leave you with the Alliance and you'll never see my face again." There it was, his best card.

"That a promise or a menace?" Leia purred, suddenly playful.

"Don't turn my words around, Princess, not this time." He was smiling again, recognizing the old spark. "Ya know what I mean. Let's put it this way: I don't push, you don't run and maybe we can meet somewhere in the middle... and of course, nothin', _nothin',_ you understand me, will ever happen that you don't want."

"You serious?"

He managed to retain a stern look for about twenty seconds.

"You _are_ serious," she recognized, her eyes widening in surprise. "What I'm supposed to do now?"

"Say yes and kiss me," Han Solo proposed with a husky voice, the exact tone that always made her knees weak even if she was sitting. His arms had come somehow around her waist and the tip of his nose grazed gently hers.

"You're such a scoundrel..."

"That's what you like about me..."

Without more preamble, he tilted his head and softly placed small kisses first on the corner of her mouth and then along her lower lip. She still hesitated but lifted her chin, exposing her throat, and he obliged the invitation. With a shudder, she braced herself to him and spoke quietly:

"Just be patient with me..."

"All the patience in the galaxy for you, Princess," the smuggler answered, now cradling her delicate skull with his hand.

Her trembling lips finally reached up to meet his. 


	10. Chapter 10

**10. Day 77 – Part II**

The programmed fifteen minutes had passed. The so-called conversation between him and the Princess was broken and forced, but it didn't matter. It served his purpose.

The eyes of the Corellian captain kept going back and forth between him and Princess Leia in an ineffective attempt to grasp what was going on between them. Oh, yes, young Organa and he knew each other very well after the time they spent together on the Death Star. They didn't need many words to understand what the other was thinking. Not anymore.

The Dark Lord raised and strode out of the room. "Take them away," he ordered.

* * *

They have been taken along a corridor. Three stormtroopers around her, five around him, they have been deprived even of the comfort of holding hands. Princess Leia's group headed the march, and then came Han Solo's. Darth Vader and Calrissian closed the procession.

"Leia!"

The muffled scream made her stop and turn around, bumping into the stormtroopers behind her.

But she only saw the edge of a black cape disappearing through a hatch and then the white corridor was empty. Han was gone.

Gone.

* * *

The rack was a prior incarnation of _Twelve Hells,_ only a less sophisticated one. The purpose was nevertheless the same: to inflict as much pain as possible on the subject. The man strapped to it closed his eyes when he was lowered to his torment.

_Leia... five days... resist... _The electricity through his brain disrupted his coherent thinking, but did not manage to eradicate her from his mind.

* * *

The stormtroopers took Princess Leia to a security room. The facility was elemental: a desk, a chair, a computer terminal, a communication device, a wall full of surveillance monitors. Everything was there: the landing pad where the Millenium Falcon rested, the mess hall, the suite. Her eyes rested melancholically on the image of the hunk of junk where she had lived the happiest days of her live.

He entered the room and the troopers retired. "Watch," Darth Vader ordered. His black-gloved fingers moved slightly and the screens changed, one by one. And every one of them showed the same image: the pain-contorted face of a Corellian smuggler.

The audio went on and his screams filled the room. She turned instinctively and covered her ears with her hands, in an unconscious and futile attempt to shield herself from his agony. _Good_, he thought, _she's already betraying him_. _But she needs to learn._

An invisible fist smashed her face against the screens and another delivered a blow to her stomach. Retching and bleeding from her royal nose, the young Rebel fell to her knees.

"Watch," the Dark Lord repeated.

She obeyed.

_I never told you, Han_,_ and I'm so sorry now, _was her only thought, _we're going to die and I never told you that I love you... Goddess, please, help him!_

Her anguished inner cry transmuted in little ripple through the Force. It was just a tiny echo in the Force, but the Sith next to her felt it and rejoiced.

* * *

Four hours later Leia Organa was dragged again along a passage. Lando Calrissian and his aid met them in their way. The Baron made the group stop and addressed the shaky Princess.

"Are you alright?"

She didn't answer. She only stared at him and if glares could kill, he suspected he would have dropped dead immediately. It was the second time in this awful day that someone had looked at him like that and he definitely didn't like it.

Damn, she was beautiful, even in her present disheveled state. The way she held her head upright and those eyes... No wonder the old pirate was head over heels for her. He had noticed it as soon as he saw them together. Han had always been a romantic after all, a natural born rescuer of damsels in distress. Only not this time.

"Follow me," he ordered the stormtroopers. They hesitated for a seconds but then complied. Leia didn't pay much attention to where were they going until the sunlight almost blinded her. They were in the suite where Han, Chewie and her had stayed earlier.

"Why are we here?" She asked in surprise.

"You don't want Han to see you like this, do you?" Baron Calrissian stated.

It was only then that she noticed that the pearly-gray cloak was stained in blood and the red suit was dirty and stank because of her stomach contents. "Alright," she agreed. Mechanically, she entered her former room and started to strip down the soiled clothes even before the hatch closed completely.

The gambler-turned-administrator waited outside. This deal was becoming worse and worse every minute and now he had to deliver the news to Solo. But if he played his cards right, maybe something could be salvaged.

* * *

They had tossed her indelicately into the cell. He didn't see it but he knew. And then he felt her cool hands through his hair and kisses on his forehead and it was like a blessing. Han Solo let her soothe him, and it was good.

The hatch opened again.

"Lando," she spoke.

* * *

He was resting again on the hard slab, the new bruises starting to show. Goddess, he looked so tired and sick. Her hand started to caress his scruffy hair again and she whispered in Han Solo's ear.

"I love you," the Princess said.

But exhaustion had claimed him and he was already asleep.


	11. Chapter 11

**11. DAY 21**

One, two, three, out, one, two, three, in, don't stop, two, three, out, see the wheel, two, three, in, it never stops, two, three, out...

It was taking her more and more time every night to relax and fall asleep. First of all, the flood of feelings that plagued her since that day when she discovered that vid. It did not seem to diminish with time. It was not that she hadn't remembered Alderaan before, but now, she realized that a dimension had been missing from her memories. Before that day, she had only remembered the facts, not the feelings.

But Han was there always, to prevent her from getting lost in that see of feelings where she sometimes feared to drown. He was her anchor, her life preserver, the pier waiting imperturbable for her to come home. And he accepted her. She felt it. His unconditional acceptance was the most precious gift he could have given her.

Not that he didn't make things difficult, sometimes. He had his particular method to bring her back to reality, to this reality where Alderaan was only a memory and he and she were getting closer every day. And this particular method of his was nothing more and nothing less than touching her.

Touch. The old, basic, primal medium of communication between sentients.

He was keeping his word, though. He was not being pushy at all. He had learned quickly where her limits were, how far she would allow him to go and restrained himself admirably. Of course, he made little mistakes now and then but she didn't rebuke him so hard anymore. His touch made her feel safe now, not menaced like before, and she was infinitely grateful for that.

Anyway, there was one moment of the day that was special, different from the rest of it. It was that moment of the night when she decided to go to sleep and he walked her to her cabin. Then, he would give her a goodnight kiss. In this kiss, he would allow himself to let go a little. In this special kiss, he would put to use all of his skills, his charm, his body, his mind and his soul. Maybe he was silently pleading to be admitted inside the room that had become forbidden territory since this strange relationship between them had started; maybe it was simply the way he was.

What was for sure was that night after night, she found it more difficult to extricate herself from him. When she finally was alone in her bed, she found more difficult to sleep. She had to use Luke's breathing exercise more and more to fall asleep, and even then, many times, she would awake after a few hours with no apparent reason. And sometimes, with a reason.

* * *

His comm unit chirped and he awakened with a start. He felt for it in the dark and answered it.

"What's up?" Han Solo asked. A familiar voice came out of it but he could not understand a thing.

"What is it, Chewie? Talk louder, I can't hear you..." He set the volume control to its maximum and drew it nearer his ear. He always left it activated as much as he put his blaster under his pillow. He couldn't sleep otherwise. Those simple precautions, as much a part of nightly routine as cleaning his teeth, had saved his life more than once.

"Again?" he spoke into the mike. "I dunno, pal, maybe she wants to be alone..." He listened again and shook his head. "She is? Alright, alright, I'm coming..." He closed the transmission and stretched, yawning loudly. _I bet Luke is better at this than me_, he though, slightly depressed. But he rose from his bed and slipped into a pair of slacks.

Barefooted, he padded down to the lounge.

The Princess did not notice his silent approach but flinched when he ostentatiously poured himself a glass of water. Quickly, she turned off the holo-projector and wiped her eyes with the sleeve of her jumpsuit.

Han observed her and decided that Chewie was right. That settled it. He went to her.

Leia had pulled her feet, covered with simple white socks, over the bench and was bracing her legs, chin on her knee. He approached her and brushed gently a strand of soft hair out of her face. "What's up, sweetheart?" he asked kindly.

"Nothing," she answered.

"It's not nothing. You've been crying." He said matter-of-factly, sitting by her. "Another nightmare?"

"No. Yes. More or less," she said shaking her head.

"Tell me."

"I dreamt of Luke."

"What's the kid doing in your dreams?" Han said pretending indignation. "You're supposed to dream only of me."

His bragging brought a little smile in her face, which dissipated when she continued. "He was mad at me. He was shouting at me because I had forgotten his lifeday. 'How could I forget your lifeday' I shouted back, 'It's two days after mine!' 'You forget everything' he said then. And then I awakened. And remembered..." her voice faltered and she did not continue.

"...What you've forgotten." Han ended her thought.

"Yeah."

"And it was...?"

"My father."

"What about your father?"

She disengaged her knees and turned to face him. "It was his lifeday yesterday, Han, how could I forget?"

Tears were dangling from her eyelashes again. He simply opened his arms and she threw herself into them, burying her face in his chest, just as she had done so many times in the last few days.

But as her cheek contacted with his pectoral muscles, the soft bush of his chest hair tickled her and she jerked noticeably.

"Do you want me to put on a shirt?" He asked, his voice spilling resignation.

"It's alright," she answered after a moment, resting her face timidly back on his chest, her ear reaching for the spot where she could hear the beating of his heart the best. The calm and firm pounding had soothing effects on her - that much she had discovered in the past few days.

What was a surprise that now tinged her cheeks, was that, after the first shock passed, she could find so pleasant the touch of the scruffy outgrowth he was so proud of. And his personal scent was more distinct this way too, alluring her and making her blood run wild in her veins. Who would have known? She had found his aggressively masculine anatomy almost revolting three years ago and now...

With a gasp and a pang of guilt, she realized that she had almost forgotten what she had been crying about.

"Hey, is not that bad," Han said, stroking her hair and her back. He had forgotten so many things along the years, why was she so upset because she forgot a lifeday? Anyway, it was so sweet to hold her like this. That she let him hold her like this.

"I don't understand it, Han. I've been remembering so many things these days. Things that I haven't thought about in years are coming back in flashes all the time. How come did I forget his lifeday?"

"What else did you remember, sweetheart?"

So many things. Father's cologne. Mother's lullabies. Trevin's laugh. The feel of the wind when she climbed the highest tower in the palace. The taste of Alderaanian grass, when she had idly nibbled one of its leaves. And the faint, sad sensation she associated with her other mother. So many things. So few explainable. And she had almost forgotten it all, in the past three years.

"Look," she said suddenly excited, turning in the circle of his arms and switching the holo-projector on again. "See that beach? I used to go there at dawn, when everybody else was still sleeping. I sneaked some bread from my dinner and went to the beach to feed the gulls. I sat on the sand and they flew around me, I threw crusts in the air and they snatched them. I haven't thought of it in more than ten years!"

"Yeah, you must have been quite a view...!" he said laughing. The Princess tried to change the point of view from the holo but instead, it went backwards and the scene with the dancing girls and Bail Organa appeared.

As always, her body stiffened at the sight. Han Solo held her a little more tightly and buried his lips in the curve of her neck. For a moment, Leia wondered what Father would have thought of Han. Of her being there, in the middle of the (nominal) night, trapped in the middle of nowhere, being held like this by this half-naked devilishly good-looking smuggler with the big heart.

A little voice inside of her told her that, given the general circumstances of her life, he would probably be happy for her.

Another memory assaulted her then. It was shortly after her mother died, she must have been seven years old, eight at the most. She had awakened in the middle of the night, went to his father's bedchamber and slipped into bed with him. He had held her tight against his chest, both sobbing. That had happened many times and now, somehow, she had added a new piece into the puzzle: Father had been already crying when she arrived, every time.

"Why white?"

Han's question snapped her out of her reverie.

"Sorry?"

"He wore white, and you are in white all the time. Why?"

"Mourning."

"Oh." He wished he had not asked.

"He wore white for Mother for five years. My cousin Trevin died a month before..." She shuddered and then finished. "... Before the Death Star."

Hell, they were _there_ again.

"You know?" She continued. "If I should wear white a minute and only a minute, for each person on Alderaan when it was... gone, a hundred lifetimes wouldn't be enough."

Alright, a new topic, Solo, now!

"You don't look much like your father."

She glanced at him weirdly. "No."

"Who do you got the shortness from? Your Mom?"

"I don't know," she answered dryly.

"C'mon, sweetheart. How come?"

"I don't know, Han," she repeated, hardly hearable. "I was adopted."

If someone had thrown a bucket of cold water over him, he would not have looked more surprised. Their eyes locked, his flashing green in the holo-vid light, hers lost in the darkness. Again, she had rendered him speechless, so he simply pulled her to him and squeezed her so hard in his arms that she could barely breath. But she didn't care at all.

"Let's go back to sleep, flyboy," she sighted after a while.

"You'll do anythin' for one of my goodnight kisses, dontcha?" He laughed.

She just smiled at him.


	12. Chapter 12

**12. Day 29**

It was the first time they were doing it. Han had insisted so much, that she had to finally give in and try it. The conversation that had conducted her to the present predicament was something like this:

"I can't believe you never done it!" Han Solo exclaimed.

"Well, yeah," the Princess shyly answered.

"But you should!" he alleged.

"Says who?" she defied.

"Me." the smuggler answered cockily.

"Why?"

"Because it's somethin' like flying, you don't really appreciate it until you do it yourself."

"You like doing that, don't you?"

"You betcha."

"And you wanna teach me, huh?" Her husky answer was.

"It'll be my pleasure," he said with a devilish grin.

"Let's do it, then."

"Hey, hey, stop, you'll ruin your jumpsuit that way. Here, let me do it. Yeah, beautiful."

"Captain Solo, Mistress Leia, may I help you?" See-Threepio interrupted.

"That thing looks dangerous, Han, isn't it too big? Maybe Threepio can really help us..."

"We're doing just perfect by ourselves, Goldenrod, thank you," Han dismissed him.

"I only wanted to help," the droid muttered whilst leaving.

It was like this that the last Princess of Alderaan found herself wrapped in a big apron and getting ready to the first cooking lesson of her life.

* * *

First Han brought a huge piece of semi-frozen nerf meat and started to slice it in thin loafs with a big nasty-looking knife. Then he put some freeze-dried egg powder to rehydrate in a bowl and passed a duraplast mallet to Leia.

"Hit 'em." Han instructed.

"What?"

"Like this." He started to pound energetically one slice of meat with the mallet until it was half as thin and twice as large. "That way."

She did it but without much success or enthusiasm.

"A little harder?" Han suggested. "Just imagine it's Vader down there."

The mallet hit hard on the meat and pierced it.

"Alright, alright. Not him," he said depositing a light kiss on the back of her neck. "Janson maybe?" He studied her reflection in a glass jar in front of her, counted the lines between her eyebrows and saw with relief that they diminished from three to one.

They kept working together for a while, Leia's mallet going up and down with an easy rhythm, the front of her apron getting splashed every now and then by little droplets of ejected blood.

"And who do _you_ imagine it is?" she asked without warning.

Han faked looking for something in the cupboard. "Err... I give you three guesses."

The princess smiled sweetly. "Me, me and me?"

He turned laughing eyes to her and his hands now sneaked around her waist, turning her to face him. "Hey, your hands are dirty..." she protested.

"That's what aprons are for, Princess," he answered and leaned down to whisper hotly in her ear. "Sometimes. But not lately..."

His lips trailed back to kiss her but she had placed her hands on his chest and was pushing him away, teasingly. But he was not in the mood to be denied or maybe he couldn't resist the twinkle in her eyes so he caught her forearms and drove her arms gently behind her back. Still holding her wrists together with one hand, the other wrapped her shoulders and pressed her body firmly against his. Again, he leaned down to find her lips.

"No...!"

She twitched violently in his arms and he released her immediately. Jumping back, she lost her equilibrium and had to grab the edge of the counter to steady herself.

"Leia..." Han Solo pleaded, extending his arms to help her. But she stopped him with a sharp gesture of her hand.

"Don't..." She asked, taking one deep breath after the other to calm herself. After a few minutes of silence, she raised her eyes again to him.

"I'm sorry," the Princess said.

"C'mon, I should apologize," he answered drawing her back to him. Rubbing her back with both hands, up and down, he suddenly got an idea. His hands sled down farther than usual and she jerked again, but just over the critical point they diverged, grabbing her firmly by the hipbone.

"Jump," he ordered.

"I beg your pardon?" She asked with her most regal tone.

"Jump... please?"

With a perplexed look still on her face, she complied and he assisted the leap, making her sit on the kitchenette counter, pushing aside everything on it. She was now a good half head above him.

"Now, you take command, your Ticklishness," he invited with a wink, placing her arms around his own neck. "Just beware of those knees. They're lethal weapons, ya know..."

"Shut up, Captain Too-Many-Hands," _she_ ordered just before her lips descended over his.

* * *

They were a little late for lunch but they finished their task. The thinned meat loafs were covered in breadcrumbs, then soaked in the egg-mix and back again to the crusts. When a nice pile of them were ready, Han threw the milas, as he called them, in the deep fryer that had just reached the appropriate temperature.

He was currently looking proudly at Leia, who was very focused smashing the tubes for a side-dish. As always, when she decided to do something, she did it well.

Strange woman.

Definitely the most complicated female he had ever known. He had stopped trying to understand her long ago. However, he had learned more about her in the past weeks than in three years.

Her life as a Princess and the duties and responsibilities it implied was something very hard for him to comprehend. He could understand responsibility to a partner, a friend, a lover but not to an abstraction like the People of a whole planet. He even could find some sense in her dedication to the Alliance, given that her father was one of the founders. She was a symbol to them and as that, she fulfilled her duty just for being there. But that didn't justify the fact that she almost killed herself working.

She had told him that she wasn't Bail Organa's biological daughter. That she didn't know who her real parents were or were they came from. And that had hit very close to home for him. He knew well that sensation, to look at his own reflection in the mirror and ask whom did he look like. Who brought him to life and gave him away or died before he could know her. He could relate to that. She had only been exceptionally lucky that some people like the Organas had chosen her to adopt. He hadn't been so fortunate.

As for the rest of her, for the woman behind the Princess, after the horrible experience she had lived in the Death Star, he was surprised she let him touch her at all. Anything else was an unexpected bonus. He, of course, wanted desperately to make love to her, to have her completly abandoned in his arms, to get himself lost in her. But he had wanted that for so long now, that it was really nothing more than a background noise, the baseline of his days. It was only brought to his consciousness when something in her demeanor fueled the already burning fire, like a little while ago. And he could not forget that kiss she had given him the night of her first nightmare. That hint of the passion running under her skin, maybe as wild as his own did.

Anyway, she made him feel needed and that was a weird sensation. It was the first time in his life that someone really needed him. Or so it seemed. There had been women that claimed that and discarded him as soon as he accomplished whatever they wanted from him. After a while, he had been the one to go away first without looking back. Would she too discard him as soon as she stabilized emotionally? That sithspawned holo-vid had broken down the dam that had constricted her feelings for three years apparently, making her at times as unstable as vulnerable. But it had its good side: if not, he would be still stuck with the Ice Princess. But playing improvised therapist wasn't easy and he made so many mistakes at it. She seemed to like it, though. She seemed to like to talk about Alderaan while being cradled in his arms.

Things weren't going bad all in all, at least from a certain point of view. But he wondered how long would it last. Day after day, he realized how wrong he had been in talking her into this without telling her the whole truth. Someday, she would start to ask questions about his past and he did not know how he would answer.

But he really cared for her, damn him. That was all he knew; he cared for her and he didn't want her to go away from him.

"Who taught you how to cook, Han?" the Princess asked when their meal was over, nibbling idly at a cookie she had dipped previously in ice-cream.


	13. Chapter 13

**13. Day 37**

Princess Leia had advanced so much with Shyriiwook that she could now understand Chewbacca at last, as long as he spoke slowly and did not use complicated words. And he had turned out to be a wonderful interlocutor. Of course, he was as happy as she was to have someone else to talk to besides Han and Threepio.

They were playing their umpteenth game of holo-chess. The ongoing championship had Han and her at a virtual tie with Chewie far ahead. She had started fairly behind and her travel companions beat her in every game, until she caught the particularities of her opponents and her natural gift for strategy flourished. But the Wookiee was a formidable player and still won seventy percent of the games against her.

"Hey, where did you learn that move?" She asked flabbergasted when one of Chewie's pieces jumped and wiped out three of hers, cleanly winning the match.

**Someone I met in the front**, he answered, looking a little melancholic.

The Princess restarted the board to make it ready for another game. "Which war?"

**The Clone Wars**.

"The Clone Wars? Which battles did you fought?" She made the first move.

**The defense of Kashyyyk**.

"Oh."

She knew that Kashyyyk had been part of the galactic battlefront at the time of the Jedi Purges. After the rise of the Empire, the same clone troops that were supposed to assist the Wookiees in the defense of their planet turned against them and slaughtered them. But some of them where spared, as they had always been valuable slave material. Not because of their docility precisely, but because of their strength, ability and long lifespans.

"How did you...?"

**I was captured. We had fled and hidden for days. We finally had an opportunity to go into the untamed regions of the planet, where they could not go after us. But it was a trap. I... stayed behind while the others escaped. At least my ... and my cub were free**.

"Sorry, I didn't understand the last," Leia apologized. "What was that word again? Your what?"

**Cub?**

"No, the other one."

**Ah**. He repeated the word. **My partner in life, the mother of my cub. My lifemate**.

"You are married?" The Princess could not hide her astonishment. "And have a child?"

Chewbacca nodded. **You can say so. It does not translate exactly, but it is close enough**.

"Where are they now?" she asked.

**Still in Kashyyyk. Hiding.**

"Why are you not with them?" She realized the foolishness of the question the moment she spoke it.

**Because of my life debt with Han. She understands it**.

He didn't say exactly _Han _but he used a sound that Leia had come to associate with him. It sounded very close to the word for _reckless_ but not exactly. The word for Luke was something like _light,_ but she still hadn't discovered which word Chewie used for her.

"But they need you!" she argued anyway.

**Han needs me too. And I would be dishonored if I left him. Wookiees take their life debts very seriously, you know.**

"I know." Han had explained it to her once. The life debt concept, not how he acquired one. That, he had not told and she had not asked. She knew by instinct that he did not like to talk about his past. The only thing that he had disclosed about it so far was that a female Wookiee named Dewlanna had taught him Shyriiwook and to cook when he was a kid.

When she had asked further, he had ignored her and pretended that he had something to check on the Falcon. Maybe one day he would tell her more, but she knew she could not press him. But the more sneaky part of her brain argued that that didn't meant that she couldn't do a little research.

"Did you ever meet Dewlanna?"

**No. But, in fact**, the Wookiee started, dimming his voice, **I wanted to talk to you about her.**

"Really?"

**Yes. She died, many years before I met Han. If my guess is not wrong, I think it will be twenty standard years in a few days. He shouldn't let it pass unacknowledged.**

The Princess considered the idea for a moment.

"Maybe that's why he's been a little grumpy these days. How did you find out? Did he tell you?"

The Wookiee shook his head. Years ago. He was drunk and maybe a little high too. He winced and Leia understood perfectly the situation. That's why he left the stuff, it made him talkative.

**Anyway**, Chewie continued, **I was wondering if you could have a word with him**.

"I don't know, Chewie. Maybe he won't like it. Do you think he would listen to me?"

Chewbacca turned his eyes again to the half-forgotten game.

**You make him happy. He'll hear you**, he declared.

Leia's cheeks turned a deep pink.

* * *

Eventually, everybody heard _him_. Chewie, the Princess and See-Threepio, who walked as fast as he could down a corridor trying to make himself inconspicuous. While the Wookiee waited patiently for the storm to die out, Leia confronted him.

"What right d'ya think you OR the furball" - a long finger pointed accusatory at Chewie- " "have to sneak into my private business?" Han Solo shouted to the Princess angrily. "You really think I wouldn't remember her without a blasting memorial service?"

"I'm sure you remember her, Han, but..." The politician tried to placate him, with little success.

"You think I can forget the only person that was kind to me when I was a kid? You really think that of me?" His eyes shone like durasteel, hard and hurt.

The only one? Ice run down her spine."No, Han, but we thought..." she managed to answer.

"I don't care what you thought!"

The Princess crossed her arms on her chest.

"Fine, Han. But you must know that we'll do it with or without you. You decide if you'll join us."

* * *

Two humans and a Wookiee were seated around the holo-chess table over which a single green candle was lit. 

Chewbacca calmly recited the prayers for the gentlebeing only one of them had known. Han Solo followed his words silently, his head bent in respect. His lips twitched slightly now and then in recognition of some familiar invocation.

Princess Leia understood little of what Chewie said, because that type of ceremonial language was far out of her reach. Nevertheless, prayers sounded similar in every language she knew. So her focus was in the man by her side. She had never seen Han so upset and to see him abandon so completely his usual anything-goes attitude was quite shocking.

The two last days had been tense, to say the least. He had stubbornly refused to hear about the memorial, no matter how hard she pleaded or shouted at him. She had been a little mad at the Wookiee at first for sending her to the front, so to speak, without warning. But he had apologized to her extensively. After all, even two-hundred-years-old Wookiees made mistakes occasionally. But if someone in this galaxy knew the power of a prayer for the beloved departed, that person was she, and she sided with Chewie.

The two of them had finally started alone, the old warrior and the Princess. The smuggler had quietly slid into a seat minutes afterwards. And there he was, eyes reddened and jaw clenched.

When Chewbacca was done, the three of them remained unmoving. Then Han stood, grunted something and stormed out of the room. It took Leia a few moments to understand that the sounds that had come out of Han's mouth were very similar to Shyriiwook words.

"What did he say?" She asked to Chewie.

**He said 'I cared for you, Lannie'**

Oh, yes, it lacked a few consonants impossible to form in a human larynx but she recognized it now. Still, she did not catch the whole meaning of it.

"He cared for her? What is that suppose to mean?"

"Mrs. Leia," Threepio interrupted. He had observed the whole proceedings from a corner. "I think the word you are looking for is 'loved'."

Chewbacca did not agree. He said the meaning was not the same, that the Wookiees did not use the expression care for someone as lightly as the humans used the word 'love'. But she wasn't very interested in the semantics controversy between the golden droid and the Wookiee.

She stood to go after Han, but a powerful paw halted her.

**Wait,** Chewie said, **give him a few minutes**.

* * *

She found him in the cockpit, sitting in his chair, his gaze lost in the stars ahead. Silently, she placed her palm on his broad shoulder. He did not turn his face to her but his own hand reached up and he interlaced his fingers with hers. 


	14. Chapter 14

**14. Day 43**

He stepped out of the elevator and into the catwalk. The place was unnaturally clean and shiny and smelled of new metal and plastic. He knew his way well. It was not the first time he had been here.

He walked into detention block AA-23 with the confident step of one who had every right to be there.

"Good night, Sir," the guard on duty respectfully greeted him. "They're expecting you," he added and signaled him a passageway.

He nodded in response to him and headed in the way that the guard had showed him. As he approached his destination, cell 2187, he heard the echo of some screams. Nothing unusual in that, of course.

Stopping before the hatch, he inspected in the reflex the greenish-gray uniform he was wearing. He touched his beret slightly, to center it properly on his brow.

The hatch opened and the shrieks of a woman in pain became ineludible. He caught a glimpse of dirty white skin and a pair of desperate brown eyes.

"Come in, Slick," a friendly voice said loudly to be heard above the laughing and the crying, "Join the party!"

* * *

Han Solo awoke drenched in sweat, his heart pounding in a forced beat, his stomach about to turn. _I didn't do that, I didn't do that, _he reminded himself fervently.

And then the sentence mutated.

_I can't do this anymore..._.

* * *

Princess Leia's hand hovered over the controls of the hatch to the main cargo bay. Something had dragged her there, still half asleep.

_Han... Need... Guilt... Care for me..._

Her freezing feet awakened her completely.

_What the hell am I doing here?_

She made her way back to her cabin, slowly.

* * *

For hours, his mind turned around the dilemma that had plagued his nights with nightmares for a while. Until he finally found the right answer. The only one.

_That's the best I can do.

* * *

_

"Wanna see the stars?" Han Solo asked after dinner.

The question took Leia by surprise. Usually she proposed to climb up into the gunner turret to have a quiet time. Although the view did not change much in time at their present speed, it was always beautiful.

"Sure," she answered.

They generally brought they favorite drinks along, herbal tea for her, a shot of whisky for him. Occasionally, she added a few drops of his beverage to hers. But tonight he had taken the whole bottle with him, the last one on board, as he had claimed when he opened it days ago.

"Han, is something wrong?"

"Why?" he asked a little defensively.

"You're downing that like water."

"Sorry." He deposited the glass and the bottle on the gunner's seat and wrapped his arms tightly around her. After a long while, he spoke. "I wanna tell ya somethin'."

A cold hand seemed to squeeze her heart. She did not want to hear it, oh no; she did not want to hear that he would go away soon. She knew it, but she didn't want to hear it.

Another long silence followed.

This was the worst thing he had to do in his life. No question about it. He just wanted to hold her a little longer like this before everything went to hell. Before she turned her face from him and never spoke to him again. But he couldn't lie to her anymore, anytime he kissed her he felt the guilt assaulting him, anytime she embraced him he felt dirty. And the support and patience she had showed him around the Dewlanna thing had only worsened the feeling. He had been a bit mad at first, hell, more that a little mad, but she had been right. It helped. And as the memories cleared, it also became brighter in his mind what Lannie would have though of his current situation with Leia.

"I...," Han started.

The Princess waited.

_Out with it, Solo!_

"I was in the Imperial Navy."

She did not say anything. She did not move, she did not cry, she did not shoot him either. But that could change any second.

After a few minutes she turned around to observe the discouraged expression on his face and watch it turn into the most pure astonishment one she ever saw, when she answered him.

"I know... Slick," she said with a mischievous glint in her eyes. Tilting her face, she added: "Or do you prefer Vikk?"

Han Solo opened and closed his mouth, twice. The name had hurt like if he had been shoot in the chest, rendering him breathless. By the third time, he simply decided to leave it that way until something came out of it.

"Why are you here with me?" he finally whispered, his voice raw with emotion.

She rubbed her cheek over his heart, looking for her usual spot to lay her head, dissipating the pain in the process.

"Because," Princess Leia answered, "_you_ are here with me."

The back of his head hit lightly against the durasteel and he closed his eyes, letting her words and its meaning sink into his consciousness. His fingers traced lightly the contour of her face, recognizing once more the familiar features. The aristocratic brow, the proud slope of her cheekbone and the straight, firm, stubborn line of her jaw. His thumb trailed down her slender nose and landed squarely on the perfect lips.

She kissed the callosity formed on it by years and years of gripping a blaster and the Millenium Falcon's rudder. Her lips then wandered to the sensitive palm and entertained themselves there for a while until he wanted to retire and she stopped him. Under her light touch, he turned swiftly his hand to catch hers and she allowed it. She let him surround, capture and enfold her hand with his and when he believed it secured and under control, she simply pulled both to her and planted her lips on the back of his wrist, where every little hair thoroughly bristled.

Giving up, Han Solo released suddenly a heartfelt laugh that reverberated along his ship. He laughed and laughed until the sound became a little hysterical and then, sighing, he calmed again.

"How did you find out?" He asked, panting a little, wiping a little tear from the corner of his eye.

"Hey!" She pushed herself up and poked his shoulder, frowning at him mockingly. "What kind of petty Rebel organization you think we are?"

Han Solo smirked. "So you did investigate me." He had always wondered why they had trusted him so quickly. Well, the few ones that trusted him at all.

"There was no need," the Princess cleared, her own expression sobering. "Commander Tharen did thorough work. You were right there, in our databank." She removed an imaginary strand of the sleeve of her jumpsuit. "I had your record in my datapad twenty minutes after we arrived on Yavin."

He pondered briefly if he should feel flattered or outraged that she had known for so long and never said a word, but decided that it did not matter anymore. Damn. A thought occurred to him. How much had Bria put on that file? Would she have mentioned... them?

"And what do you exactly have, if I may ask?" he asked, a turning little pale and swallowing hard.

She raised a hand and started counting with her fingers. "First we have Tharen's debriefing of the Ylesia operation, then your CorSec record, your Kessel record, Carida Academy record - good grades, by the way, although you spent an awful amount of time in the brig," she turned her eyes to him, hesitantly. "Should I continue?"

He cracked a lopsided grin now. "Yeah, please... Maybe I'll even discover something new..."

But she didn't follow his joke. Instead, the Princess turned more serious.

"There is the Coronet Orphanage record."

"That far, huh?" The smuggler rubbed his chin absentmindedly.

"Yeah, but..."

"What?" He dragged her once more into his arms.

"There's nothing about you before you were fifteen, which is where that file starts."

"Ask whatever you want, sweetheart," he said with resignation.

"Really?"

"Really. I... I don't wanna secrets between you and me." A soft but long kiss on her braids sealed his promise and she knew he really meant it.

_She's gonna ask about Bria_, _Solo,_ _get ready to run, _his inner voice advised nevertheless

She thought about what her first question would be for a while. The amount of information Comdr. Tharen had gathered about him was four times what she had bothered about the other smugglers in Jabba's organization. That in itself was suspicious, but, after all, the woman was dead and Han was entitled to have had a love life prior to her, wasn't he?

_Love life? Prior to me? What does that mean, Organa?_

But this was not the moment or the circumstances to have that argument with herself. Blushing slightly, she shot.

"Tell me more about Dewlanna."

He told her, his words slow and painful.

About Lannie and Garris Shrike and about the miserable life on his ship. How she took care of him when no one else wanted to. She was old, even for a Wookie. For many months, she was the only one that paid attention to him, until Shrike accidentally discovered that he was speaking some variant of Shyriiwook instead of Basic. One of the girls (there always were a few teenager girls on that ship) was given responsibility of teaching him to communicate in a more or less understandable language. But it was more like playing school to her, there was no real interest in him. But he learned, though.

He told Leia about the huge towers of crispy, golden milas Lannie prepared for him when he felt sad or had been beaten. Then about her horrible death when there was a fire in the galley and she tried to control it alone. He had escaped the next day to make himself a living in the streets of Coronet.

Leia shivered at the thought of such an awful end to the noble Wookiee that had raised Han. He had every right to be so upset about it. She realized then that she was not the only shuddering. Tightening her arms around his ribcage and looking for a way to comfort him, she stretched her neck and her lips to brush the nearest area of exposed skin, which happened to be his throat.

"How does the orphanage fit into it?"

"I wanted to be respectable. To be accepted in Carida to become a pilot. I turned myself in."

"At age fifteen." Another shudder, another brush.

"More like fourteen," he corrected.

"It says fifteen." Shudder, brush.

"I lied. I was tall for my age, I guess. Didn't want to be there more than needed."

"Han?" Brush and shudder.

"Yeah?"

"Do you know how old you are, exactly?" Brush, shudder, brush.

"No... But I'll settle for whatever you consider appropriate if you keep doing that..."


	15. Chapter 15

**15. Day 57**

She was running through a jungle. She was sure it was night and yet she could see her way through it. The place had an eerie look, though. Everything was tinged not in the natural greens and grays of a swamp but in artificial red.

She ran and ran, dodging tress and jumping over emerging roots and rocks. The soil was damp and sticky, and slippery at the same time. She turned her head left and right, looking for something, someone, she did not know, but she had lost something and she could not find it.

Then she saw him, standing still, tall and dark across a clearance. She stopped and observed her enemy and knew that she hated him more than ever. Darth Vader looked back at her, without saying a word.

The Sith then turned around and left the place. She wanted to follow him, tried to lift her boots from the mud but she could not. She was rooted to the ground and he had done something awful to Luke...

A strange sound, like a woman or a child crying filled the air and Princess Leia awakened with a start, trembling with rage.

_Don't let him control you, Organa... He's not here... And Luke is safe, I'm sure he is... Think of something happier... Han... Yeah, think of Han..._

The morning after the medal ceremony in Yavin came to her mind. She had looked for him because of something she promptly forgot when she saw him, his bare back glistening with sweat and shining in the sun as he worked on something on the outside of the _Falcon_. Han had turned to her when she called his name, roguish grin rushing to his face, eyes the same color of the luxurious jungle around them. She had stopped dead on her tracks, surprised and disconcerted. Weren't his eyes brown yesterday? He had laughed at her visible confusion and she had answered with an acid remark about his ship. Then the first of hundreds of verbal battles happened, to the amusement of the Rebels passing by.

Nevertheless, tonight she imagined another ending to that encounter.

Her focus was so intense that soon she saw only Han's smiling face in her mind, his warm eyes, his sensuous lips, his hard shoulders, his arms wrapping her tightly, his hands, his hands on her...

In the dark, she blushed furiously, realizing that she was shaking for a totally different reason than anger against a Sith Lord.

Since sleeping was evidently not an option, she got up early and decided to start breakfast. Han was usually the early bird, something he probably caught from Carida, but in truth, after more than fifty days in space with almost nothing to do, everyone's sleeping habits were scrambled.

Nevertheless, her thoughts could not be diverted so easily. _What am I doing? _She though angrily. Using him to keep other things out of her mind? That was not fair. What would Han say about it? _Hey, at least lemme share the fun... _Yeah. She could even imagine the mischievous wink and that brought a sudden smile to her face.

Alright. Caf. She measured carefully the spoons of grounded beans and water to brew three cups. The stuff was getting scarce and they had agreed in limit themselves to one cup each every day, so they wouldn't go without before arriving at Bespin. She pressed the button and the appliance begun to hum.

She liked to be around him, that was for sure. And he was so changed lately. Mmm, no, that was not true. He hadn't changed at all. She was the one that had changed. Changed the way she saw him, the way she looked at him. Obviously, she had always known that he was not only the rough smuggler he pretended to be. Her father had taught her well to take into account what people actually did, not what they claimed they did. That was what had always infuriated her about him, besides his scoundrel's freshness, that he acted and talked so differently and never acknowledged the difference.

Bread. Four slices, into the toaster. There was not much to accompany it at this point, but it was getting dry anyway.

The way he had opened to her, although it was something she had been waiting for a long time, had moved her so much she could not even start to express it. And he seemed so happy after that. Of course, not everything she had in those files was true, and she trusted him in that, so they had spent at least a couple of days comparing notes.

Now, where was that thing Han loved for breakfast? She had seen the package in the cupboard a few days ago; it could not have been gone so fast. Maybe the top shelf?

She had had a good laugh when she had discovered what the yellowish mud he had for breakfast was. He had become pretty offended then but now it wasn't that funny anymore. He hadn't had a proper childhood and therefore a few extravagances could be overlooked. She could almost picture him, skinny-legged and big-eyed, pretending to be an adult. No, no scar. That had come later. The tenderness spreading suddenly through her was so intense that she didn't want anything but hug him until he suffocated.

With a sigh, Leia appraised the distance between her and the top shelf. Hmm, that was a problem.

* * *

Han Solo watched Princess Leia roam around the lounge looking for something that was not screwed to the deck. He had seen her studying the cupboard and had stopped, still unseen, curious about what she was planning. Besides, she didn't like to be surprised.

She hadn't found anything mobile of the right height and sturdiness so she was going back to the kitchenette. There, she stood examining the situation again for a few seconds and then, with an agile movement she placed a knee and both hands on the counter and lifted herself up. Once both knees were up, she started to detach the safety net that prevented the things on the top shelf to fly by themselves in inappropriate moments.

It was then that Han remembered what had happened the last time that he had undone that net. With a muffled _Watch out!_ he rushed to her side, but it was too late. A canister had already popped out.

Leia Organa turned her face to where Han's voice was coming from, but her opposite hand flew down to her side, halting the fledgling flask midways in its way to oblivion.

"Good reflexes," he praised her, helping her down. She threw her arms around his neck, canister still in hand, and kissed him. "Good morning," she breathed against his lips.

"They're good indeed," he laughed, plastering himself to her. But she pushed him away, directing him to take a seat.

"Stay there," she ordered.

"Why?"

"I'm doing breakfast today."

He simulated a heart attack and she stuck out her tongue to him, in a completely not princess-like way. Then he started to push some buttons in the panel behind him.

"What are you doing there?" She asked, intrigued.

"Recording it for posterity. Luke's never gonna believe me."

"How many bets are there between you and Luke about me?" she asked, slapping his shoulder playfully.

But the second time she lifted her hand to smack him, he caught her wrist and pulled her to him.

With a feline movement, he settled her with her back on the bench and was leaning over her, kissing her with intensity almost impossible to reject.

* * *

She knew it then. She knew with pristine clarity where they were heading, sooner or later. Where she _wanted_ to go with him. But she also knew that it was not going to be now. Not while they were still so confused. Everything was still too vague between Han and her. She had a Rebellion to lead and he had to go pay Jabba. He was a free bird and she could not bind him to her while she wasn't free herself to commit to him.

Maybe when he came back, if he came back. Maybe.

Nonsense.

What would they be then? Solo's new girl? The Princess's lover? What else? They had never talked about what would happen once they arrived to Bespin and right now, her imagination could not see beyond his bed.

And sadly, that was not enough.

She hated herself for that, for not feeling free to give herself to him, but she couldn't help being who she was. She was the last princess of Alderaan and she could not follow her impulses at will, or could she?

More than that, she still was not sure about how Han felt about her. He cared about her, he had said that more than once and she knew it to be real. But was he thinking about some kind of commitment or was he planning to keep it casual? She dared not to ask. She was scared of the answer, whatever it would be.

And evidently, if she could think so coolly while being kissed like this by the sexiest scoundrel in this part of the galaxy something was very wrong with her. But then she noticed that even if her mind was cool, her body wasn't and was acting by its own will. It was like if she was observing herself, themselves, from an external point of view.

That kind of dissociation had happened to her once before. In the Death Star. She had snapped out of her body to avoid feeling what was happening to it. Alderaan's destruction had triggered that reaction again and she had remained for a long time afterwards in that safe place where she could feel nothing and keep herself under control. The connection had never been totally restored and that had been the origin of the Ice Princess. Only this time, she actually wanted to feel it and not just to observe. She needed more time to achieve that, though. She needed a truce with the Ice Princess.

* * *

"Han," she moaned, when he momentarily liberated her mouth to gasp for air, pushing him gently away.

He seemed to realize then what he was doing, where his hands were. He retired them as quickly as if what he was touching was on fire. And maybe it was. At least she hadn't kneeled him in some sensitive place, he though, philosophically. So he took no offense in her gesture. He was a little confused, though, because he could have sworn she was enjoying and actively participating in it, but he knew he couldn't rush it. He had promised patience, to her and to himself, and patient he would be.

**Get yourselves a room**, a very annoyed Chewbacca growled between entering and exiting the lounge.

"Must I really erase it?" Han asked innocently to a deathly-embarrassed Leia.


	16. Chapter 16

**16. Day 67**

"So, you got a degree in political science? At age sixteen?"

"Yep."

"Ya're a brain, ya know."

Her compulsion to excel had started, no, not started, grown, when she had discovered that the Organas were not her birth parents, shortly after Bail's wife passed away.

"Didn't you notice before?" she slapped his shoulder playfully.

"Don't start..." he warned, waving his finger, making her blush slightly. "Any exams failed?"

She was made of the right material, obviously, and that's why the Viceroy had given his agreement to her political career. Han wondered if he had ever noticed that everything Leia achieved was because of the need to feel worthy of her place in the Alderaanian Royal Family. All right, she was a righteous and compassionate woman, but those ideals could have been fulfilled in many other ways, not necessarily jumping into the senatorial hell. But she had tried to explain that it had been the need of the moment, some allegiances had shifted and Father needed a reliable person inside.

"One. My tutor was very surprised and I felt terrible."

"One? Very disappointing, Princess..."

"Long story..."

Her mood had changed. Something was bothering her, but he could not define what. Maybe all of them were having cabin fever. He shifted the weight of her upper body from the side of his chest to the curve of his arm and turned her slightly so he could see her face. They had achieved a new level of intimacy lately, where she would sit between his legs and he could enfold her completely. From a pragmatic point of view, it eliminated the limb numbness problem. From a more romantic point of view, she was slowly surrendering and he was enjoying every minute of it.

He had lost count of the number of women he had been physically intimate along the years and yet, he felt that he had never been so close to anybody ever. So close as he had became to Leia.

"I'm all ears, sweetheart."

She sighed but started. Her voice though, turned darker and darker as the story progressed.

Darek had been the one to give her her first kiss. Or whatever his name was.

They had met in the Royal Gardens, during one of the Flower Festivals. She was too old to dance by then but she enjoyed wandering between the people, unnoticed. No, her image had not been public until she started her Senate campaign. He claimed to be a student at Aldera University. She told him her name was Lari, the alias she always used when she went out of the Palace. They spent the day together in the city and by the end of it, she thought he was the most wonderful guy in the galaxy.

She made the mistake of telling Winter the next day. Her friend, a year older and less romantically inclined, located him immediately in the security holos. To make a long story short, the young man turned out to be a spy with whom the Emperor had tried to infiltrate the Organa family.

Her father did not get mad at her or punish her in any way, although it was clear how disappointed he was. He counseled her to answer any holos or calls from Darek, to meet with him if necessary. It was not wise to show that they had uncovered him. So, what should have been her first young love, became a massive counterintelligence operation, until the spy mysteriously disappeared. She did not speak to Winter until the incident was concluded, but it was more out of embarrassment than anger.

It was difficult to imagine that the often hard-as-durasteel woman and expert politician he had in his arms had been once a naive teenager that believed whatever the slug had told her. It made his blood boil in his veins with anger. But maybe this explained her compulsion for asking and asking about every little detail of his life. Maybe it explained her mistrust of anyone, except for a few selected people.

"I still can't understand how I bought everything he said!" She continued, her voice tense with anger. "Damn hormones!"

"So, you and Darek..." he asked, suggestively.

She lifted her head, half-annoyed, half-indignant. "Han! I was _fifteen_!"

"Well, _I_ was thirteen..."

The little piece of information plopped out of his mouth before he realized it. Sithspit! What kind of sex-maniac would Leia think he was? But she seemed more sad than offended.

"You were a kid..."

"There were no kids on Shrike's ship."

"I know," she said, brushing softly her lips to his, the sweetest touch he ever felt. He could almost never predict her reactions and so he was in an almost permanent state of awe.

And then, without any questioning of her part, he felt the _need _of telling her the whole story, of sharing that part of him with her. It was an odd feeling, something new to him. Guilt and fear, like what had compelled him to confess about his Imperial past, did not accompany it. His survival instinct had always told him to share as little as possible of his privacy with anyone, Chewie being the only exception, to a certain limit. But now, her sweet touch had changed everything.

"It was the night Lannie died," he started. "I was out of my mind, wanted to kill Shrike for not giving her the proper care. She could have been saved, you know, if he had bothered to send her to a place with a bacta tank big enough for her. He said that she was too old to be profitable." His voice spilled a hatred she had never noticed in Han before. "Anyway, she saw my intentions and... Distracted me."

His gaze seemed a little lost for a moment and then he continued. "Her name was Teila-Nim. She was a couple of years older than I was, one of the girls the son of a Sith kept on board for his personal entertainment. She saved my life that night and gave me..." he chose his words carefully. "The only thing she had to give. I ran away the next morning," Han concluded.

"What happened to her?" Leia asked with trembling voice.

"Six months later Shrike's ship was taken down by a CorSec cruiser. Everybody died."

"I'm sorry."

He nodded into her braids.

* * *

The only thing she had to give... She suddenly knew she had to do something. Something had been brewing inside of her for days. She had to do something, soon, or she would explode. _You can't_, the Ice Princess said. _Shut up!_ Leia shouted back.

* * *

The most amazing thing happened then, at least from Han's point of view. Leia took his hand and drew it to her lips, as she had done a few times before. But then, after kissing his palm, she made it slide down her throat. Both hands lingered for an eternal moment on her collarbone until her shaking one caught the fastener and started to pull it down.

He stopped breathing for a moment and his hand instinctively tried to halt the movement.

"Touch me, Han," she begged then. "I... Touch me, please," Leia repeated and guided his hand inside her jumpsuit.

Her breast was warm, and soft, and trembled with every breath she take. His fingertips explored the palpitating roundness, taking notice of how well it fit into his rough hand.

She emitted and odd sound, half sigh, half moan when he sled his fingers beneath the cup of her bra and he had to apply all his self control not to tear all her clothes apart and make love to her right there and then. Instead, he remained almost unmoving, feeling the nipple grow hard under his palm.

It was not the only thing growing hard and it wasn't the first time either but the intensity of it made him realize what in truth he had known for a long time: he had never desired any woman the way he wanted Leia Organa. How could this little concession of hers could arouse him so much and so quickly was beyond his comprehension but he had pretty clear that he could not afford to loose control now. Because he cared and he wanted it to be good for the both of them.

It had always been a matter of honor for him in his past relationships to give physically as much as he took. No woman had been disappointed in that department. But everything with Leia was different. He had learned by now that he had to let her set the tone, slow down to her speed, accept what she was ready to give and receive.

Straightening his back, he held her in a more upright position, so his lips could find the curve of her neck and then slid down to the shoulder. There, his free hand tugged gently the collar of her jumpsuit away. "You..." he said between kisses, "...Are... " -The bra's strap fell down her shoulder, leaving it bare – "So beautiful..."

He made his way slowly back in the same style, until his teeth nibbled softly at her earlobe. "What do you want me to do?" he whispered.

* * *

She could not answer the question hotly breathed in her ear. She was pinned between two wills, the woman that was fighting for her right to be loved and the Ice Princess. Who was going to win in the long run was a mystery to her.

* * *

It finished as quickly as it started. Her body went from soft and inviting to rigid marble. He had to ask, he could not avoid it any longer. They had been dodging the issue for weeks but they would not go anywhere like this. She had to face her fears, what had happened to her.

Nevertheless, before he could say anything, the Princess turned in his arms and hid her face in his chest. Hot tears mixed with sweat on his already damp shirt.

"I can't," she cried, "I'm not ready..."

"There's no hurry, Leia," he sighed, caressing her back.

He had never regretted so much never have installed a real water shower in his ship. Damn, he could use a shower right now. A cold one.


	17. Chapter 17

**17. Day 75**

The three of them were definitely having bad cases of cabin fever. They tried to stay out of each other's back, but that was not easy. Threepio had stayed deactivated in a corner since Leia had found Han trying to con him into touching a high voltage outlet, just out of boredom. Chewie growled and kicked a panel, randomly, from time to time. The fact that they have been reduced to ration bars and recycled water was not helping either.

Leia's mood swings had become very notorious. One moment she was laughing like a girl with one silly remark and the next one, she went to lock herself in her cabin, remaining there alone for hours. She had avoided any more physical closeness too. No more late chats in the gunner turret. Damn. He missed them, even if they sometimes frightened him. In fact, she seemed to prefer Chewie's company to his, to his chagrin, for the last few days.

Moreover, although he was starting to need some fresh air too, he was finding the idea of parting with Leia more and more unsettling, to say the least. He realized now that he had grown so used to her presence that saying goodbye to her would be a colossal task, even if he had every intention of coming back as soon as possible. Yes, he had come to that conclusion lately. He did want to come back. He had not mentioned the matter to her, though, because he did not like to make promises he may not be able to keep. Not about things that he really cared about. He did not want to hurt her with words that were nothing more than air.

She was having problems to sleep again. And nightmares too. Not as violent as the one that had started her confidences but he had heard her once that he was passing by her cabin. A muffled "No!" and he had been about to enter, but it was not repeated. He had stood there, almost for an hour, ready to intervene.

* * *

She was falling. She could even feel the whirling of the wind around her. A sense of dislocation, of being in two places at the same time. Something bad had happened to Luke and she had to go to him.

The billowing of a dark cape, and then everything became dark. A cave, someplace...dark. Han, lying very still, very pale... Han!

_That's not true! Don't be stupid, Organa! Stop this, you can do it!_

But she couldn't, and the nightmares now came every day, adding little horrible details everytime.

* * *

"Let's play sabaac," she proposed after dinner.

Her mood seemed lighter and her hair was half down. It was something unusual; she had maintained the same style since Hoth, with slight variations, until today after her nap.

"Aw, Leia, you already owe me half the galaxy..." Han Solo protested. "What are you planning to pay with this time?"

"I'm sure you would be able to think of something, Captain," she teased, reaching up on her toes and planting a soft kiss on his cheek. "C'mon, I'm bored..."

Had she been drinking something? They had run out of Whyren's Reserve weeks ago... He wondered if she had found... No, her breath was clean.

"Chewie, bring the deck!" She called, kind of overexcited. _What the... ?

* * *

_

She had been winning round after round. Han and Chewie had gained a few, but Leia was leading the game by far. At first, Han had relaxed, convinced that it was only random luck. After a few more hands, he started to worry. The chips had somehow found their way to her side of the table. They had agreed in playing for tokens and then the final winner would choose the prize.

It was not as if he had never lost a game of sabaac. Just never against Leia, since he had taught her. Although she had the necessary coolness to put up a good sabaac face - she was a politician after all - she lacked the mathematical mind needed to calculate quickly the odds, given the combination of cards already exposed. Her talents run more along a holistic vein.

Then he caught a glance exchanged between his first mate and the Princess. The more he covertly observed them, the more he was convinced that there was something else going on.

He noticed then a subtle movement of her thumb rubbing a card any time she won a round and realized exactly what was happening.

With a dead serious expression on his face, he lowered his cards on the holochess table and crossed his arms on his chest.

"You're cheatin'," he announced, looking straight into those deceptively innocent chocolate eyes.

Leia covered her mouth with her cards, blushing deeply. Chewbacca let out a mourning growl. Han's trademark lopsided grin spread slowly through his face.

"You're gonna pay for this!" he menaced playfully, reaching to tickle her, but at the same time he gave her enough time and space to run away. She jumped away from him, giggling, and the chase begun.

Chewbacca rolled his eyes and started to collect the cards and chips, having a feeling that this game would never be finished.

Han Solo hunted Leia Organa through the ship, both laughing loudly. At some point, he cornered her in the same spot where they had kissed for the first time. But as he leaned down to reenact the original one, she sneaked under his arms and run away, looking back to make sure he was following her.

She finally sought sanctuary in her cabin but he was right behind her and interposed his hand between the closing hatch and the doorway. "Ouch!" he shouted when it shut on his wrist.

The hatch swung open again immediately.

"Are you alright, Han?" the Princess asked with genuine concern.

"Gotcha!" he exclaimed triumphal flashing at her his predator grin. Taking her by her shoulders, he pushed her on the bed, immobilizing her with the sheer weight of his body over hers. She did not try to free herself, but smiled brightly at him.

For a moment, they let the heat of their bodies mingle, feeling it spread and multiply by means of the intimate contact. Han brushed away the loose strands of hair that lingered on her face and his lips slowly descended over hers, almost touching them but backing up at the last possible moment. The third time he tried to tease her, she just sled her fingers into his hair, pulling him down.

It was a long, sweet, demanding kiss that made them become more breathless and sweaty than they already were. When they parted, though, there was a mischievous light in his eyes.

"And now, Missy, you're gonna pay for cheatin' on Han Solo," he proclaimed, and started to unceremoniously unfasten her jumpsuit's front.

Her body froze. He felt her stiffen under his frame and diverted his gaze from the zipper to her eyes. Her flushed cheeks had turned to feverish, and her bright eyes had a dull gleam on them, like thin ice over a piece of machinery.

"What... are you doing?" She whispered, gasping as if there were not enough oxygen in the room.

"Nothing... A joke, it was only a joke!" he protested lamely.

He had gone too far and it was too late. Everything was so confusing. But he could not stand the fear in her eyes. He disengaged from her and she simply stayed there, unresponsive, her face blank.

He lost control then. Completely and utterly lost it. Shaking her by her upper arms, he started shouting at her.

"Stop doin' this, Leia! Please! Can't ya understand I won't hurt you? Because I won't! I couldn't! I care for ya!"

Leia just stared at him as if he was talking a language she did not understand. Something shifted and rearrenged itself inside him then. His voice hoarse and strained, Han let it finally out.

"I know I'm not worthy of you, your Highness, but I love you!"

And with the last sentence, he let her fall on the bed again and strode out of the room.

* * *

Leia turned in the bunk, trying to breathe, to cry, to regain control of herself. Han's words echoed once and again in her soul. Care, love, love, care...

With a start, she stood in the room, feeling as if she was just awakening from deep sleep. Slowly, she looked around, finding herself alone.

"No," she whispered in horror. Her eyes scanned the wall for the hatch controls and palmed it open upon locating them. The door had not receded completely yet when she was throwing herself through the opening.

She did not go very far, though. She just bumped into the hard, broad chest of Han Solo. Their arms wrapped simultaneously around each other, with fierce desperation.

"Don't go," the Princess said.


	18. Chapter 18

**18. Day 76 - Part I**

Han Solo couldn't sleep. His mind was still reeling, reliving what had happened the night before.

They had slept in each other arms, though fully clothed. With a bit of surprise, he realized that it didn't matter. What did matter was that he had finally freed what he had in his heart and that she hadn't run away from it.

He loved her.

He couldn't deny it any longer.

He had lied to himself, to Chewie and to the rest of the galaxy. For many years, he had declared to anybody that would listen that he just liked her sassy wit, her spirit.

Yeah, her spirit. That too, but he had always had that terrible temptation to explore every single curve of her body, wondering how she would sound at the peak of passion, but he now knew better.

He knew now that the only thing he really wanted was to make her happy, whatever it involved. And if that meant to sleep fully clothed for an undetermined number of nights, he was ready. He'd had too many heated nights in his life to know that _that_ was not what made two persons really close.

She had finally broken down and confessed what had really happened in the Death Star. The horrors she had lived there, the rise of the Ice Princess, her savior and her demon. It was strange, almost ironic, that things were so different than he had supposed. Darth Vader had raped her mind, not her body, at least not sexually. _Twelve Hells_ had left its marks on her, nevertheless, even if the Imperials had thrown her in a bacta tank afterwards.

"Any time Vader went away, they came," she had almost cried. "Every time they came, I was sure they would do it. But they never..." Her head had shaken in disbelief. "Maybe they were saving it for the second round, I don't know. They... insulted me, mocked me, played with me but never touched me. But the fifth day... the fifth day..."

The shivering of her body had had nothing to do with his proximity.

"Take your time..." he had said, cuddling her, the familiar nausea settling in his stomach.

"Vader... Vader came and..." Her voice had become a mere whisper, a shadow of the woman he knew. "He was... _inside_ my mind." The dread in her voice had been palpable, dense, and crept into his now undefended soul.

Then, like if all that were not enough, they had commited the most unforgivable of all their sins: they had forced her to watch Alderaan being obliterated.

At some point they had snuggled up on the bed together, looking for each other's warm. They stayed that way all night, just relishing each other's presence, until it was time for him to relieve Chewie.

The night had not been completely calm, though. She'd had some kind of nightmare again, making her very agitated. She had mumbled his name before he could awaken her. And Luke's too, to his dismay. The kid was never too far from her thoughts, for some mysterious reason, but he had to accept it, as he had accepted everything else about her.

This night, though, she had not asked him to stay and he had not wanted to impose himself on her. And she had not said anything about how she felt about him. Maybe going away would be a good thing. Give her some space and time to think. _That's probably the best thing to do.

* * *

_

Princess Leia brushed methodically her hair before going to bed. The brush was Chewie's spare one, lent to her the first day of the voyage. It was the only thing that seemed to relax her lately.

She had given up the breathing exercise days ago, when she had started to dream as soon as she put her head on the pillow, anytime she tried to sleep. Even if she practiced it for more than an hour, it did not help anymore. The nightmare repeated itself over and over. Last night's details had been Han's shirt and Luke's swollen eyes.

The bunk seemed stupidly big all of a sudden. She wished she had asked Han to stay with her again, but something had stopped her when he had said goodbye for the night.

His kiss.

His goodnight kiss had been the most innocent one she had ever received from him, in perfect accordance with what had been happening along the day. She had spent most of it curled in his lap, and that had been weird, because his embrace could have been the one of a brother. It had scared her to death. Had he given up on her? She could not blame him if he had. She had never imagined that she would sleep in the same bed with Han Solo and he would not try anything.

By morning, they would be arriving to Bespin and then Han would be probably gone to pay Jabba in no time. That scared her even more than his unusual behavior. Would that be all? She missed him already and the idea of not seeing him ever again was horrifying. That was weird, how could she miss someone she had not parted with yet?

Last night he had said that he loved her, once. And then they had skimmed over the subject, or at least she had. Because she did not know how to answer that. Instead, she had told him about the Ice Princess. Maybe it was something he did not intend to say, something he had regretted as soon as it was out.

_I'm so stupid_, the Princess thought. _Is this really the best I can do?_

The feeling of his hands and his lips on her skin was a burning memory that would not go away, though, no matter how hard she tried to put it aside. If she was going to be honest to herself, she had to accept that she wanted him with an intensity that frightened her.

Her body ached for him.

That was something she had read in novels that she had cataloged as totally unrealistic, believing it sincerely to be a poetic license of the authors. Those things did not happen in real life and those who believed that it did, were just romantic fools, weren't they? However, it was the only description that fitted what she felt.

_Can you live with being just his lover? Can you bear to see him go away, eventually? _The Ice Princess queried silently.

"I've endured worse," Leia muttered.

Restless, she paced the little cabin and still, her body ached for him.

* * *

The hatch to the cargo bay hissed open, letting in a dash of light. Out of reflex, Han Solo sat on the cot pointing his blaster in the general direction of the entrance, the covers sliding down his bare chest. It was pitch black again, but he knew somebody else was in the room.

"Who's there?"

"Just me, Han."

Leia.

What was she doing here? She had never come in here before, not once in the seventy-six days of their voyage.

He discarded the weapon, cold sweat on his back at the though of what could had happened had he shot without warning. The sound of bland steps told him that she was approaching, feeling her way in the darkness.

"Here," he guided her.

Their hands met blindly. Hers were cold and shaky.

"What's up, sweetheart?" He asked, pulling her gently down to make her seat.

"I... couldn't sleep," she said, kneeling by him. Another nightmare, probably. Han rolled onto his knees and wrapped her shoulders with his arms, dragging her near his body. "It's alright, Leia, everything is alright," he murmured in her ear.

"No, it's not..." she shook her head, burying her face in his shoulder. Something soft and silky brushed his bare skin with her movement.

Her hair. Completely unbraided.

* * *

She had to make him understand what she wanted. She had come this far, and now she could not utter the words for it.

She needed him.

She couldn't deny it any longer.

She had lied to herself, to Han and to the rest of the galaxy. It might be love, for one or both of them. It may be not. She did not know a thing about love. But she cared for him as much as she knew he did for her and wanted him to know it. And this could be her last opportunity to be with him, to show Han who she really was, beyond the Ice Princess. Who she wanted to be, for him.

Without hesitation, her arms sneaked around his neck, pulling him into a firm kiss. And when he wanted to part, she just grabbed him more tightly.

* * *

She was acting strangely. Kissing him insistently, sliding her hands down his back, running her fingers through his hair. It was almost as if she was... provoking him. He was suddenly acutely aware that he was wearing only a pair of shorts and she, barely one of his shirts. This had to be stopped before it went too far.

Her lips went up his throat, stopping at the jawbone, nibbling delicately his unshaven chin.

"Hey, whatcha doin'?" he gasped with a start. She hushed him putting her fingers on his lips. Approaching his ear, she whispered yearningly.

"I want this... I want... _you._"

His heart skipped a beat but when it restarted, he felt as if his blood pressure had been doubled, more or less. He couldn't believe what he was hearing. What happened to the Ice Princess, to the damaged girl he'd been caring for the last couple of months? Who was this flaming woman he had in his arms?

This was something he had imagined thousands of times, since he had met her, but never assumed it would become necessarily real. He had had short glimpses of hope, yeah, but even in the last days, when they had become closer than ever, he had come to think that maybe it would never happen. Just last night...

"Han... _please_..."

Her raspy voice brought him back to reality, if this was reality and not some delusion from his imagination. He wanted her so much that his head felt like spinning, everything was so confusing.

"Why now?" he asked.

"If you want it and I want it, why not?" Her voice sounded strange in the dark, and it seemed that she was determined to make him eat his own words.

"I'm goin' off to pay Jabba soon," he reasoned.

"I know." Her lips skimmed his shoulder, setting him on fire almost against his will.

"What's this then," he said, his words involuntarily tinged with sarcasm, "some goodbye present, Princess?"

"No!" 

She wriggled in his arms, trying to go away, but he did not release her. "Shhh, I'm sorry," he apologized into her hair. "I'm just a nerfherder."

Her breath slowed and she relaxed again. He brushed his fingers through her mane and she tilted her head, leaning into his touch.

"I... _need_ you, Han," she whispered, kissing his palm, and he could not stand it anymore.

_To hell with everything_.

"I love you," he repeated and kissed Leia deeply, not giving her time to say anything else. She responded to his kiss with matching passion, all caution abandoned. It was, by far, the most beautiful feeling of his entire life, the way he had always wanted to have her. He did not care at all if she said the damned words or not. It had taken him three years to recognize it; he could give her that much too. Words were not important.

If she only wouldn't hate him in the morning, he reflected through the haze of desire that was quickly engulfing them. He had to give her a chance to rethink it; a chance for him to cool down, if that was humanly possible.

_Think, Solo, think quickly_. "I... I gotta go fetch somethin'... for you not..." he babbled, somewhat incoherently.

"I've got my shots right before the evacuation, Han." Her voice was clear and matter-of-factly.

"You? Why?"

The question left his mouth before he could repress it. He wanted to smack himself in the head for being so careless. It was none of his business why she had had birth control shots. Oh, maybe it was now, but that was not the way to ask it. She had not had a lover before, she had all but confessed. Or maybe had she? Or had she wanted to take one? Was she getting ready to take one? Who? Certainly not him, she had never given him the smallest sign of that before this voyage. Luke? He doubted the kid could hide something of this magnitude, should it happen.

"Mon Mothma insists in all the female personnel to take the shots, unless you specifically want a baby."

"Oh." _Laserbrains._

"You?" Leia asked with some amusement in her voice.

"Should have taken one three weeks ago," he confessed somewhat embarrassed. "I don't have more onboard. I wasn't exactly planning this..." -and added quickly, the scoundrel kicking in - "...trip."

She rested her cheek on his shoulder and he felt her smile.

"What next?" The Princess asked softly.

"I'm gonna fetch something else." _Time, time, need some time_.

"What, flyboy?" Leia Organa slid a fingertip along his triceps. He swallowed hard.

"Something strong."

"I don't need it, Han..."

"No, you probably don't," Han Solo said sighing. "_I_ need it."


	19. Chapter 19

**19. DAY 77 – Part III**

Two fluted glasses and a bottle of sparkling wine dangling from his fingers, wearing only shorts, Han Solo pressed his forehead against the cold durasteel of the cargo bay hatch.

Kriff, he had never been so nervous at the perspective of making love to any woman in his life. It had caught him off-guard, having almost given up the idea of something of this kind happening with Leia at this point of their relationship.

But she was serious about this, as serious as she always was with anything else. Days ago, she had said that she was not ready, but was she now? What had changed in between?

Nothing was simple with her, was it? And it probably would never be.

If they were going to do this, he had to do it right from the start. There could be no second chances with this. For once, the Princess had asked something from him that he really wanted to give her, share with her, and he would be up to the challenge. He needed to show her how much he loved her, needed to learn her in all possible ways. Make her happy. Where this would lead them, he didn't know and he didn't care, as long as it were with her. He only hoped it wasn't some altered state of mind on her part.

_Just remember the three basics, Solo_, Han addressed himself. _She's a Princess, she's inexperienced, she's been tortured. Oh, hell.

* * *

_

Where was Han? What was taking him so long? 

She did not want to think. Maybe he had changed his mind and was trying to find a polite way to tell her.

_No._

He had said the words again and kissed her in a way she had wanted it never to end. She did not know which had been more powerful, those words or his kiss. It did not matter. Any remaining doubts had vanished in that moment like the mists in Alderaanian mountains when touched by the sunshine. Did love feel like this? She only knew she wanted to make him happy. To be happy, with him. And that there was not much time left.

The restlessness took hold on her body again and she chewed her lower lip nervously. In the dark, Princess Leia closed her eyes and stretched her senses, trying to recognize his steps on the nearby deck.

* * *

Han palmed the door open and coded the little service lights along the bottom of the walls to light. He had to see her eyes before going further.

She was not where he left her, on his makeshift bed. The Corellian found her instead curled up in a corner of the room, sitting on the freezing floor. He was used to it, having spent almost all his life in spaceships. She was not.

"Hey, whatcha doin'?" He said as he rushed to her side, noticing her bluing toes.

In his way to her, he deposited somewhere the bottle and the glasses. Sliding his arms below her knees and behind her back, he lifted and moved her swiftly to the insulated cot.

"You're trembling," he noticed, rubbing her arms and legs.

"My hands are dirty," she shot back, suddenly grinning.

_Uh-oh_. "Need a scoundrel in your life, hmm?

Leia's cheeks flushed. "I might be ready for one," she whispered.

Han Solo slowed the movement of his hand on her thigh until it was a soft, tender brush. "I can be nice," he said, flashing a lopsided grin.

"You'll have to teach me, though," the Princess added, lowering her gaze and reddening more deeply. Gently, he lifted her chin to make her look at him again, locking his eyes into her brown, liquid ones.

"We'll both learn," he stated. "I've never made love to a princess before."

"I'm not a princess anymore. I never really was." She reached with her hand to touch his face.

"You'll always be a princess to me," he whispered, only a breath away from her lips.

He finally leaned down and kissed her, slowly and deeply, savoring the coolness in her lips, the warm in her embrace, the heat of her answer. Raising her onto her knees without breaking the contact, his hands traveled from her shoulders down her spine, exploring gently the soft flesh covered by the thin fabric. Encircling her narrow waist and venturing, almost reverently, beyond and beneath. The shock almost made him pull away when he discovered exactly nothing under the shirt.

She mimicked every one of his movements, hesitantly at first and enthusiastically later, until her palms rested positively on that part of his back usually crossed by his blaster's sling.

"I think you're a quick learner," the smuggler proudly declared, feeling her lips and her tongue progress along his throat.

"You shaved," she observed coyly.

"Yeah," he breathed against her collarbone, his skillful fingers finding the first button of her shirt.

No more words were needed for a while.

* * *

The first button was undone easily, but she stopped him, taking his hand in hers. He waited,for a horrible moment pretty sure that she had changed her mind. But she simply guided his arms around her neck and started to unbutton the shirt herself. He played with her hair and her mouth, until she was ready. With a single movement that revealed all her royal upbringing, Leia discarded the garment and gave herself fully to his caresses.

For a while, it was all kissing and tasting and mutual discovery, neither of them wanting to rush what they had wanted for so long. However, from time to time Han felt her jerking in his arms, as if he had brushed a raw nerve. Panting heavily, he finally put some distance between the Princess and him.

"Leia, tell me where those needles were," he asked.

She shook her head.

"Yeah, sweetheart," he commanded tenderly, cradling her jaw and thumbing her cheek. "I wanna be sure you know the difference between an imperial probe and me."

Her voice a mere whisper, she told him. He thoroughly covered with kisses every place she named, trying to replace the painful memories with new ones, until he was sure her quiet moaning was only from pleasure.

"Those were ten. Where were the other two?" He softly asked.

She turned her face from him, too ashamed to look him in the eye. Han wanted to cry and to kill somebody at the same time. Those bastards, doing that to an innocent girl. But better not to think of her as an innocent girl now or he'll never get on with it. "You relax, Princess, I'll found where they were," he said, trying to inspire a confidence he didn't feel.

He slid his hand between and up her thighs, feeling her muscles tense under his touch. "There?" She shook her head, her eyes lost in the ceiling. "There?"

"Higher" she said with a small voice.

"There," he said as he felt her whole body go suddenly rigid. They had been dangerously close to her most sensitive zone, one at each side. A wave of nausea swept through Han Solo at the thought of how much pain they must have inflicted her. Regaining his control, he continued. "Now, just don't be scared and let it flow, sweetheart..." he announced, right before he slipped his fingers inside of her.

A moment later her eyes rounded, giving him a look of astonished wonder. He crushed her lips with his own once more, feeling her body slowly starting to respond while he kept working on her. A minute later, the lines on the bridge of her nose started to soften and the corners of her lips curled slightly upwards.

"You like that, uh?" he whispered almost to himself, barely waiting for her nodding emphatically. "Then you'll probably like this as well" he said cockily, his lips and his tongue promptly replacing his fingers.

With a guttural sound, she closed her eyes, arched her body and started to shake her hips with a rhythmical movement. And he felt more than rewarded for his daring move when she entwined her fingers in his hair, encouraging him.

She was almost ready, or that was what he thought at first. But when he raised his head again, he saw her blank expression and realized that the Ice Princess was back. Disengaging gently from her, he seated leaning his back on the panel and pulled her softly to him, in the familiar position they had adopted dozens of times in the gun turret.

"Let's have some wine, Princess," he proposed to a somewhat disoriented Leia.

* * *

The wine must have been strong or at least her resolution was, because no longer after, she faced him and wrapped her legs around his waist. His hands on her hips guided her, slowly, very slowly, so slowly that he had to start solving the hyperspace equations for the jump from Corellia to Coruscant in his mind in order of not failing her.

But he did not and they were finally joined in the most intimate of ways and she cried softly his name and it was glorious.

"Easy, your Highness," Han Solo said triumphal after a while, "Wait for me."

* * *

Finally, Han's wish was granted and he heard her. Clear and loud, and there was no mistake about its origin. The small hold he still had loosened and everything exploded.

* * *

Chewbacca left the cockpit to get a glass of water. While in the lounge area, he heard sounds that his sensitive ear immediately identified with the Princess's voice. Was she having another nightmare? The Wookiee approached her cabin but realized the sound came from another direction. The cargo bay. He heard then a second voice mixed with the first.

Having shared close quarters with Han Solo for more than ten years, he recognized at once what was going on. With a quick step, he grabbed a carafe of water and returned to the cockpit, sealing every hatch in his way.

_Finally._

* * *

Leia Organa had felt her body climb to unbelievable levels of tension and pleasure upon Han's touch, a tension that demanded a release the dimensions of a thermal detonator explosion. She had felt for a brief moment her body scattered in pieces all over the place, only to find that the fragments were falling together again, fitting better than before, matching Han's body curve by curve. The tears that flowed freely down the corners of her eyes were just the excess of joy in her soul.

* * *

Han Solo buried his face in his Princess mane. He wanted to rest there till the end of time. Greedily, he inhaled the scent formed from the mixture of bodily fluids that would be from now on and forever, uniquely theirs. And if some tears of his were added to the mix, he didn't care. "'Love you," he murmured, feeling her nodding in response.

* * *

He was beautiful. The most beautiful man in mind, spirit and body she ever met. And, for now, he was all hers. For now, their naked bodies still entangled under the covers, a cocoon inside the cocoon the Falcon was, Leia was at peace with the galaxy that had brought him to her arms.

An old Alderaanian poem she had memorized long ago for an assignment from her teacher materialized suddenly into her consciousness.

_And thus, when afterward comes looking for me  
Who knows what death, anxiety of the living,  
Who knows what loneliness, end of the loving_

_I could say to myself of the love (I had):  
Let it not be immortal, since it is flame  
But let it be infinite while it lasts.

* * *

_

He still couldn't believe what had happened. The beautiful Princess had come to him. _His_ Princess. He liked that, although he knew he scarcely deserved it. Expressing his love for her in this way had felt so damn good. It had not been technically flawless maybe, and the Ice Princess had tried to interfere, but it had been perfect in its own way. Just perfect.

* * *

Han was apparently sleeping, a possessive arm draped tightly around her waist. He looked younger asleep, innocent. She could not stop herself and reached to touch his hair, smoothing it out of his eyes. Eyes that opened promptly, giving her an amorous, amazed, mischievous look.

"Thanks," she whispered.

"Don't thank me, Princess," he interrupted smugly, "you ain't seen nothin' yet."

She blushed for the umpteenth time and smiled tenderly.

"I was referring to your coming back for me in Echo Base, Captain," Leia said regally.

For a while, there was a competition between them on who had the biggest grin.

"Anytime, sweetheart," he answered at last, huskily, nuzzling her neck, "I can always use someone to get out and push."

Leia's giggles turned into moaning when his attentions to her throat became more insistent. Then, with a dexterous maneuver, Han pulled and flipped her so she rested on top of him.

"Need another ride?" He asked devilishly.

* * *

The commlink chirped repeatedly and Han Solo reached for it in the darkness. He spoke briefly through it and then turned to Princess Leia, drawing her again to his warm.

"We're entering Bespin system," he announced, a resigned note in his voice. "Gimme ten and the 'fresher is all yours, your Highnessness," he said with a soft kiss on her temple.

* * *

The poem is not mine, of course. It's the last part of _Soneto da Fidelidade_ - Sonet on Fidelity - from Brazilian poet _Vinicius de Moraes._

_E assim, quando mais tarde me procure  
Quem sabe a morte, angústia de quem vive  
Quem sabe a solidão, fim de quem ama _

Eu possa me dizer do amor (que tive):  
Que não seja imortal, pôsto que é chama  
Mas que seja infinito enquanto dure.


	20. Chapter 20

**20. Day 77 – Part IV**

She bumped into him while exiting the fresher. Throwing her arms around his waist, she buried her face into his fresh-pressed shirt.

"Everything alright, Princess?" Han asked.

"Everything, flyboy," she lied. She would not ruin his happiness this morning with her stupid hunches. She wanted to ask him not to use this particular shirt today, but she did not. He had worn this shirt dozens of times, why would it be different today?

"Ya know," he continued, "when I come back, I'd like for you and I to go away alone for a few days, I dunno, maybe somewhere with a beach... What d'ya think?"

When I come back, not if I come back, not should I come back. Right. She let his permanent optimism permeate through her being. "Sure," she answered, "I'd like that too."

* * *

It was the red dawn of Bespin and not the cool wind or the lonely landing pad what gave Leia the chills when she stepped down the ramp of the _Millenium Falcon_.

"Look, don't worry, everything's gonna be fine," Han tried to reassure her, "trust me."

She trusted him. But not the rest of the galaxy.

Skeptically, she witnessed the reunion of the so-called friends. At last, Calrissian approached her.

"And who might you be?" He asked smoothly. The Princess gave him her name.

"Welcome, Leia," he greeted, kissing her hand. It was obvious that he was displaying all his charm just for her.

She almost chuckled when she noticed the half-amused, half-worried look in Han's eyes. _Great, THAT kind of friends_, she thought. He rescued her hand from Lando's hold. For a brief moment, she forgot her anxiety. It had been so long since two handsome men competed for her attentions. _This is going to be fun.

* * *

_

The Baron-Administrator guided them to the best hotel in the city and even to their suite's door.

"The technical crew will be starting their shifts in an hour," he was saying. "You can call room service if you want to have breakfast meanwhile."

Han took him apart and explained him schematically the circumstance of their departure from Hoth and Leia's lack of wardrobe.

"I see," Lando said, going back to the Princess side. His eyes appraised her figure expertly, from toes to head. "Hmm, forty-two if I'm not mistaken," he told her, "and forty-four, right?" His gaze leveled at Leia's chest.

The Princess nodded, blushing deeply.

* * *

Han sneaked into the bedroom after her. He flopped backwards onto the bed while Leia inspected the giant bathroom.

"He's hiding something, Han," she said coming back and pacing the room.

"Lando's always hiding something, sweetheart," he laughed. "Come here," he added huskily, patting the mattress.

Chewie's roaring was heard outside just then. "I think breakfast arrived," she observed, nervously. Sighing, he left the soft bed and stopped her before she could open the hatch.

"Can't believe you'd trade me for some fresh fruit so soon," he teased, leaning down to kiss her. She seemed to have an endless capacity to get embarrased and he could not help loving it.

* * *

He had come personally to check on Leia and tell her that the repairs on the Millenium Falcon would be soon finished. For some strange reason, their comm units did not work on Cloud City. He had to ask Lando about that.

He peeked through the archway and saw her pacing in front of the window. Gods, she looked so gorgeous in that outfit! Yet, the fanciest clothes in the galaxy could not rival the breathtaking view of her he had been blessed with only a few hours ago.

* * *

Princess Leia Organa sat on the floor of a detention cell in Cloud City, Bespin. On a hard bunk by her side rested her lover, Han Solo. Yes, her lover, for just one glorious night. Her rough, reckless, bold, tender, beautiful, nerfherder lover. And her love too.

Long gone were the daydreams where she wore that space blue gown that Lando provided, the one with the audacious slit, and told Han the words she knew he was waiting for, with the sunset for witness. Instead, she had finally whispered them in this cold and sad room and he had not been conscious enough to savor them.

Chewie kept himself occupied mounting Threepio back. But his head jerked up suddenly and he gave a soft warning bark to the Princess.

**Someone's coming.**

* * *

He had been dreaming of his beautiful Princess when the stormtroopers grabbed him and pulled him onto his feet. She was saying something in his dream but he could not recall what. Without a word, the white-armored soldiers stripped him of his jacket and put restraining bands around his wrists and his arms.

"No!" Leia protested, but they simply shoved her aside.

* * *

They stepped down the stairs cautiously, Leia first with Han and Chewbacca in tow. The facility had a gloomy atmosphere, with orange lights and cold fumes everywhere.

The Princess looked around, trying to recognize the place. No, this was not the place of her dream. Maybe there was still hope... But no. With horror, she heard the exchange between Han and Calrissian.

"What's going on, _buddy_?"

"You're being put into carbon freeze."

Her eyes searched for Han's for a glance that she knew had to last forever. This cannot be happening, his eyes said. Everything else became blurry, because nothing else mattered anymore, nothing except his eyes. As long as she could see his eyes, everything would be all right. A strange heaviness fell upon her, like if she was moving through deep water.

_This is all my fault, _Han thought._ I should have paid more attention to Lando and not to Leia's outfits, or lack of..._

"Put him in," the Dark Lord ordered.

Chewbacca, oh dear Chewbacca, started to growl and toss stormtroopers right and left, in a futile attempt to stop the inevitable.

She was drowning, drowning... She could barely hear Han's voice addressing the maddened Wookiee. She could not breathe... Then she felt compelled to turn around and face the Monster that had presided over the worst moments of her life.

_Say goodbye, Princess_, Darth Vader sent over the Force, _your destiny awaits you._

_You can take him away from me, but you can't take his love from me, _Leia thought, and turned her back deliberately to the Dark Lord, blocking him out of her mind. Instead, she laid her hands on Chewie's powerful paws. With that simple gesture, she accepted Han's transfer of the Wookiee life debt, in the same natural way she had made her own her father's leadership of the Rebel Alliance.

The smuggler and the Princess kissed then, in a fierce, desperate way, oblivious to the pitiful or scornful views of friends and foes. Of them all, only Lando looked away.

A painful moment and the troopers dragged him to the hydraulic platform. From this horrendous event, Leia would remember every detail, every feeling, for the rest of her life. The little trail of sweat along his cheek, his tousled hair, the rumpled shirt. His haunted eyes.

Her own voice, reverberating in the vast chamber.

"I love you."

She was not sure at first if she had said it aloud or not, but Han answered her nevertheless, with the words that would soothe her pain, keep her going in the upcoming months.

"I know."

He knew.

And then she could not see his eyes anymore and she welcomed the Ice Princess back.

* * *

_I'm sorry, Leia_, was Han's last coherent though.

* * *

_Good_, the Dark Lord said to himself._ She's strong. She would be a perfect match for the boy._ He noticed then the Princess's rhythmical, controlled breathing. _Luke's been already teaching you, I see. Good, _he repeated.

* * *

A certain numbness fell upon Leia when the fumes raised savagely from the dreadful pit, as if she had been frozen too with Han.

Nobody talked as the newly casted slab was taken out and placed on the surrounding platform. One more push and it rested flat on the floor, where it landed whith a sound that resembled a mourning bell.

The Princess braced herself to the Wookiee but it was difficult to discern who was supporting whom, because both of them were shaking helplessly.

"Well, Calrissian, did he survive?" Darth Vader asked.

The Baron-Administrator studied the slab's controls for a long while before acknowledging. "Yes, he's alive... and in perfect hibernation."

Again, everything became blurry to Leia, as she and Chewie were dragged along a corridor amidst a stormtrooper squadron. Then she suddenly felt first a presence and then shooting.

_Luke?_

Then she saw him. "It's a trap!" she shouted instinctively with all her might.

* * *

The escape was so fast, that she did not have time to think at all as they ran through Cloud City following Lando's lead. Amazing how she had suddenly trusted him, but she would do anything, no matter the risk, just for the chance of rescuing Han.

They did not succeed, though, and Fett took him away from Bespin. Leia then followed blindly Chewie until she found herself in the Millenium Falcon, sitting in Han's pilot chair.

_Goddess, why?_ She cried inwardly, the sorrow and grief threatening to overwhelm her, in spite of the Ice Princess. Again, she felt Luke's presence. Much clearer than before, much stronger. Much more urgent. And it was now not only his presence that she felt, but his voice too, as clear as if he was talking at her side. As clear as Vader's intrusion in her mind, only much gentler, safer.

_Leia, hear me!_

_Luke?

* * *

At last, Luke was safe, mildly sedated to ease the pain from his stump and his soul. What had Darth Vader done to him? They had fought, that was evident. But she felt a fundamental change in Luke as well, something she could not exactly locate, but that much was as plain as the missing limb. There would be time later to solve this mystery, to learn why she had heard him so clearly in her mind. For now, he was safe and that was all that mattered._

Her dreams had been only partially right. Luke had been in grave danger and he had fallen down a vent to the vane from where they had rescued him... What had happened to Han... well, that she had not see. Maybe her dreams were not that accurate after all. Or maybe it was something still bound to happen.

* * *

Later, on their ride through hyperspace to join the Rebel fleet, Leia and Chewie met in the Falcon's lounge. The Wookiee sat by her, one of his big paws covering her tiny hand.

"We'll get him back, Chewie," the Princess said through clenched teeth.

**Of course, Leia.**

The Princess raised a brow. "What did you call me?"

**I have to apologize to you, Leia**, Chewie started. He had never addressed her by her name before. It was the word for beautiful. She let him continue. **I used to give you another name when we first met**.

Now she knew were he was getting. "Chewie, you don't need to..."

**But I want to**, he interrupted. **It wouldn't be honorable if I didn't**. Chewbacca locked eyes with her**. I used to call you _the flea_.** Leia chuckled softly. **You know, tiny, restless, annoying...**

"...Bloodsucker," Leia finished. She smiled at her hairy friend. "Han told me."

The Wookiee growled and tilted his head.

**Leia, remind me when we rescue him that I have to kill him**.

"Not before me, Chewie..."

It was not easy to read his facial expression, but it was clear that he was about to cry, or the Wookiee equivalent of it.

**Why don't you try to rest a bit?** Chewie finally offered, **I'll keep an eye on Luke.**

* * *

She had every intention of going to her cabin – Han's cabin – to rest a bit but her feet brought her to the main cargo bay.

There she stood, dumbfounded, facing the makeshift bed with its rumpled sheets. With a muffled sob, she suddenly collapsed on it, clutching tightly the pillow that still harbored Han's scent.

Later, when all the tears had been spent, she composed herself, wiping her face dry. _Chewie doesn't need this and it doesn't help Han in any way either. _With firm hands, she collected the sheets and Han's garments from yesterday – _only yesterday? _– which she had found in a careless pile in a corner of the room.

Stepping out of the cargo bay, she dropped the clothes into the cleanser unit. Her hand hovered over the controls for a while.

"This is not the end, Han Solo," she menaced aloud, and pressed the button to start the cycle.

With a firm step, she went to check on Luke.

THE END

* * *

_**Thanks for reading:)**_


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